The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection

or, The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life

By: Charles Darwin

Narrated by: Robin Field

The Origin of Species sold out on the first day of its publication in 1859. It is the major book of the 19th century and one of the most readable and accessible of the great revolutionary works of the scientific imagination. Though, in fact, little read, most people know what it says—at least they think they do.

The Origin of Species was the first mature and persuasive work to explain how species change through the process of natural selection. Upon its publication, the book began to transform attitudes about society and religion and was soon used to justify the philosophies of communists, socialists, capitalists, and even Germany’s National Socialists. But the most quoted response came from Thomas Henry Huxley, Darwin’s friend and also a renowned naturalist, who exclaimed, “How extremely stupid not to have thought of that!"

Public Domain (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“One of the most important contributions ever made to philosophic science.” ( The New York Times)

An excellent book of monumental importance.

Beautifully written and narrated. Darwin was so incredibly thorough and explained his work and ideas so clearly that it baffles me that there are still people that do not understand them. The narrator does an excellent job - it felt that Darwin himself was speaking to me. I highly recommend this book... it should be in every hotel and motel room draw.

Not exactly easy listening

I'm sure this historically groundbreaking work is essential listening for people studying the subject, but as an interested layperson I should have gone with a more recent work studying the work of Darwin and its impact on our understanding of evolution.
This work is quite a repetitive overview of his research which though interesting, was not exactly easy to listen to and I found my attention wandering during the narration.

I loved the book

it was mostly information already known to me, but it was interesting to hear it from the perspective of first learning it. I absolutely love this author, his voice is perfect for reading books like this.

It is Darwin presenting his most important work

I did not read the book, I listened to the Audible version which was well done. I am not sure I would have finished the book if I tried to read it. There was way too much taxonomy and I am a chemist not a biologist. Listening to the book and I did listen carefully, I was impressed at the detail Darwin put into this book. It is not surprising that it took until 1859 before he felt he had everything in order so that he could publish. It is probably a good think that Wallace prodded Darwin enough that he had the courage to publish which at the time would have been condemned by the bible thumpers in the US of today. I don't think we give Darwin enough credit for the courage it took to do the research needed to support his work on Natural Selection. I my opinion Darwin is one of the most important scientists in human history. The work of Newton, Galileo, Einstein, Rutherford would have been done by someone else. There were and are plenty of hard science types around who would have come up with the discoveries of the physicists and mathematicians. Darwin was looking backwards in time and then postulating how prehistoric creatures would change and then ultimately change the world. It is not everyday that an intellect comes along who can synthesize what is gleaned from the past and project the path the future will take.

Pleasant Listen

This book is charming, informative and historically formative. It's amazing how much Darwin understood about heredity without understanding DNA. I can understand how darker philosophies could be derived from his work and used to justify the destruction of Native American people, and the WW2 holocaust, but I'm not certain if Darwin intended this-he seems to be more science geeky than intentionally political or philosophical. I liked that he uses a Rogerian argument style rather than an atagonistic one.