The Monk in the Garden

Author: Robin Marantz Henig
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 1328868257
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 319

Book Description
This acclaimed biography of 19th century scientist Gregor Mendel is “a fascinating tale of the strange twists and ironies of scientific progress” (Publishers Weekly). A National Book Critics Circle Award finalist In The Monk in the Garden, award-winning author Robin Marantz Henig vividly chronicles the birth of genetics, a field that continues to challenge the way we think about life itself. Tending to his pea plants in a monastery garden, the Moravian monk Gregor Mendel discovered the foundational principles of genetic inheritance. But Mendel’s work was ignored during his lifetime, even though it answered the most pressing questions raised by Charles Darwin's revolutionary book, On the Origin of Species. Thirty-five years after his death, Mendel’s work was saved from obscurity when three scientists from three different countries nearly simultaneously dusted off his groundbreaking paper and finally recognized its profound significance. From the perplexing silence that greeted his discovery to his ultimate canonization as the father of genetics, Henig presents a tale filled with intrigue, jealousy, and a healthy dose of bad timing. Though little is known about Mendel’s life, she "has done a remarkable job of fleshing out the myth with what few facts there are" (Washington Post Book World).

The Monk in the Garden

Author: Robin Marantz Henig
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780618127412
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 308

Book Description
A study of the groundbreaking work in genetics conducted by Gregor Mendel, acclaimed as the father of modern genetics, argues that the Moravian monk was far ahead of his time.

Designing a Garden

Author: Michael Van Valkenburgh
Publisher: The Monacelli Press, LLC
ISBN: 1580935524
Category : Gardening
Languages : en
Pages : 209

Book Description
The intimate Monk's Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston embodies the design principles that inform the work of noted landscape architect Michael Van Valkenburgh. In Designing a Garden, Van Valkenburgh presents the design of the Monk's Garden at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, an intimate, walled garden that Laurie Olin has described as "a masterpiece, and not a minor one." The book documents the evolution of the garden's design, which is based on the concept of meandering paths through a dreamlike woodland to create a contemplative space. Sketches and models show how the idea was worked out, and lush photographs reveal the completed garden through the seasons. Van Valkenburgh's text explores the origins of his love of landscape and plants in his family farm in Upstate New York and how this has influenced his intuitions as a designer. He shares the full background story of the Monk's Garden, focusing on the experimental nature of design work as well as the challenges and satisfactions of the small scale and the historic and cultural context. Designing a Garden provides a unique first-person account of the design process from the most prominent landscape architects in the country.

Virginia Woolf's Garden

Author: Caroline Zoob
Publisher: Jacqui Small
ISBN: 9781909342132
Category : Gardening
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
This chronological account takes you through the key events in the lives of Virginia and Leonard Woolf through a history of their home, Monk’s House in Sussex, where Virginia wrote most of her major novels. The story of this magical garden includes selected quotations from the writings of the Woolfs which reveal how important a role the garden played in their lives, as a source of both pleasure and inspiration. Bought by them in 1919 as a country retreat, Monk's House was somewhere they came to read, write and work in the garden. Virginia wrote first in a converted tool shed, and later in her purpose-built wooden writing lodge tucked into a corner of the orchard. Enriched with rare archive images and embroidered garden plans, the book takes the reader on a journey through the various garden ‘rooms’, (including the Italian Garden, the Fishpond Garden, the Millstone Terrace and the Walled Garden), each presented in the context of the lives of the Woolfs, with fascinating glimpses into their daily routines at Rodmell.

A Psalm for the Wild-Built

Author: Becky Chambers
Publisher: Tordotcom
ISBN: 1250236223
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 102

Book Description
Winner of the Hugo Award! In A Psalm for the Wild-Built, bestselling Becky Chambers's delightful new Monk and Robot series, gives us hope for the future. It's been centuries since the robots of Panga gained self-awareness and laid down their tools; centuries since they wandered, en masse, into the wilderness, never to be seen again; centuries since they faded into myth and urban legend. One day, the life of a tea monk is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of "what do people need?" is answered. But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how. They're going to need to ask it a lot. Becky Chambers's new series asks: in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter? At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

The Ink Garden of Brother Theophane

Author: C.M. Millen
Publisher: Charlesbridge Publishing
ISBN: 1580891799
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 40

Book Description
Winner of the 2011 Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award. In a monastery in the mountains of Mourne during the Middle Ages, one young monk struggled to focus on his task: copying the Bible and other scholarly books with plain brown ink made from wood bark in plain brown books in his plain brown robe at his plain brown desk. Brother Theophane was soon transferred from the scribe’s room and assigned to make the ink that the brothers used. With his natural curiosity, Theophane discovered that inks could be made from other plants besides the wood bark. Berries and leaves produced other beautiful colors. And soon, the books the monks made were illuminated with colors and drawings. C.M. Millen’s charming story of a young monk who defied the discipline of the monastery and found his own way to express the beauty of the world will inspire young readers to explore their own world and find their own voices. Andrea Wisnewski’s illustrations, inspired by the illuminated letters that the medieval monks created in books like the Book of Kells, bring to life the colors and beauty that surrounded Brother Theophane amidst the plain world of the monastery.

A Monk and Two Peas

Author: Robin Marantz Henig
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780297643654
Category : Geneticists
Languages : en
Pages : 278

Book Description
The story of the monk who experimented with peas in his monastery has all the highs and lows of great fiction. Mendel was a man of nervous constitution (whenever he had to visit the sick and dying he was so overcome physically that he had to take to bed) who was determined to work out how traits are inherited. He spent seven years in the monastery garden experimenting on over 300,000 strains of plants. Determined to discover how species change, adapt and arise anew but essentially remain the same from generation to generation, he worked out that traits are inherited independently, that they come in pairs, one from each parent. Mendel presented a paper outlining his findings in 1865, just 6 years after Darwin's The Origins of Species came out. While Darwin's work provoked agitated debate, Mendel continued to labour away in silence in his garden and his work was completely ignored. Mendel sent his paper to fellow scientist Carl von Nageli who told Mendel that his work was incomplete and unconvincing. He encouraged Mendel to create hybrids from hawkweed which Naegeli knew was incredibly difficult to achieve as he had himself spent years working on them. Was he furious that a younger man had struck on something far more original than he could ever produce? Did he deliberately divert the monk After Mendel's death all his papers were burnt in a bonfire in the monastery. Was this routine housekeeping or the result of a fit of jealousy by a monk who succeeded him as abbot? Finally, in 1900, 35 years after it first appeared, Mendel's paper was found by the Cambridge scientist William Bateson. It became immediately apparent that Mendel was onto something extremely significant. Had Darwin known about his work many of the debates about the details of natural selection might have been resolved. This is a captivating book about a remarkable and neglected man who played an enormous role in our understanding of the mechanisms of life itself.

The Monk of Mokha

Author: Dave Eggers
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 1101947322
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 275

Book Description
The Monk of Mokha is the exhilarating true story of a young Yemeni American man, raised in San Francisco, who dreams of resurrecting the ancient art of Yemeni coffee but finds himself trapped in Sana’a by civil war. Mokhtar Alkhanshali is twenty-four and working as a doorman when he discovers the astonishing history of coffee and Yemen’s central place in it. He leaves San Francisco and travels deep into his ancestral homeland to tour terraced farms high in the country’s rugged mountains and meet beleagured but determined farmers. But when war engulfs the country and Saudi bombs rain down, Mokhtar has to find a way out of Yemen without sacrificing his dreams or abandoning his people.

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy

Author: Becky Chambers
Publisher: Tordotcom
ISBN: 125023624X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 94

Book Description
A USA Today Bestseller! “Tender and healing... I’m prescribing a preorder to anyone who has ever felt lost. Stunning, kind, necessary.” —Sarah Gailey on book 1: A Psalm for the Wild-Built A Prayer for the Crown-Shy is a story of kindness and love from one of the foremost practitioners of hopeful SF. After touring the rural areas of Panga, Sibling Dex (a Tea Monk of some renown) and Mosscap (a robot sent on a quest to determine what humanity really needs) turn their attention to the villages and cities of the little moon they call home. They hope to find the answers they seek, while making new friends, learning new concepts, and experiencing the entropic nature of the universe. Becky Chambers's new series continues to ask: in a world where people have what they want, does having more even matter? At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

The Book of Longings

Author: Sue Monk Kidd
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0698408195
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 434

Book Description
“An extraordinary novel . . . a triumph of insight and storytelling.” —Associated Press “A true masterpiece.” —Glennon Doyle, author of Untamed An extraordinary story set in the first century about a woman who finds her voice and her destiny, from the celebrated number one New York Times bestselling author of The Secret Life of Bees and The Invention of Wings In her mesmerizing fourth work of fiction, Sue Monk Kidd takes an audacious approach to history and brings her acclaimed narrative gifts to imagine the story of a young woman named Ana. Raised in a wealthy family with ties to the ruler of Galilee, she is rebellious and ambitious, with a brilliant mind and a daring spirit. She engages in furtive scholarly pursuits and writes narratives about neglected and silenced women. Ana is expected to marry an older widower, a prospect that horrifies her. An encounter with eighteen-year-old Jesus changes everything. Their marriage evolves with love and conflict, humor and pathos in Nazareth, where Ana makes a home with Jesus, his brothers, and their mother, Mary. Ana's pent-up longings intensify amid the turbulent resistance to Rome's occupation of Israel, partially led by her brother, Judas. She is sustained by her fearless aunt Yaltha, who harbors a compelling secret. When Ana commits a brazen act that puts her in peril, she flees to Alexandria, where startling revelations and greater dangers unfold, and she finds refuge in unexpected surroundings. Ana determines her fate during a stunning convergence of events considered among the most impactful in human history. Grounded in meticulous research and written with a reverential approach to Jesus's life that focuses on his humanity, The Book of Longings is an inspiring, unforgettable account of one woman's bold struggle to realize the passion and potential inside her, while living in a time, place and culture devised to silence her. It is a triumph of storytelling both timely and timeless, from a masterful writer at the height of her powers.