Word: darwins
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...author of witty and mysterious curiosities, Cathleen Schine, takes an unexpected, wrong turn to the Galapagos Islands with The Evolution of Jane. The existential questioning of the protagonist, Jane Barlow Schwartz, is based on Charles Darwin's Origin of Species. With the additional layering and listing of the names of famous thinkers such as Freud, Marx and Nietzsche, Schine sets out to prove, as she stated in an interview, that she "is a pseudo-intellectual. And [she's] really good...
...when Schine returns to the cold, somewhat scientific pseudo-Darwinian logic that she falters. There is an insultingly blatant parallel between Darwin's theory of evolution and the evolution of Jane's friendships and identity. There is no mystery about this self-explanatory connection, but at last Schine introduces a secret family feud. However, the writing again makes any interest vanish. Throughout the novel, the rules of algebra and syllogism appear, "If A=(?) and B=(?), then all one has to prove is (?)." The logic is straightforward, giving the reader time for their own conclusions: if chapter 1=(heavy blinking...
What I am able to see on this chunk of the Pacific is a minute fraction of what there is to see. At Point Lobos in Carmel, the mist creates false mountains over the water. The waves are humped like porpoises. Kelp, giant forests of seaweed by which Darwin was enthralled, shows only at the top. These plants, which can grow at a rate of 20 in. a day, reach down 100 ft. to granite reefs. The kelp is tethered by stipes-stems, structures that connect the base, or holdfast, to the leaflike blades. Gas-filled floats at the base...
...find Darwin's of high quality, but somewhat pricey...
Williams: Yes. Darwin's and Lee's Sandwich Shop are very popular...