Anyone familiar with science history will recall Robert Hooke. But exactly how much do we know about him aside from the fact that he was the author of the beautifully detailed Micrographia and that Isaac Newton destroyed his portrait? Lisa Jardine fills in the gaps with the newest biography on Hooke.
Hooke was born on the Isle of Wight to a curate with political proclivities. His brush with Charles I while he was a boy profoundly affected his political preferences later in life. He spent much of his time exploring the scenery of the Isle which was remarkable for its geology and fossils. A brief stint as a painter's assistant was perhaps one of the reasons why he was so good at drawing.
Later, as he made his way through London, he worked with Robert Boyle (who actually mostly "supervised") on some critical air pump experiments and became the first Curator of Experiments at the Royal Society. After the Great Fire of 1666, Hooke and his friend and collaborator Christopher Wren helped rebuild London. It was here that his temper got him into trouble. Feeling that he never got due credit for the work he did he began the feuds which would lead the public to view him as a hot-headed crackpot.
Like Samuel Pepys, Hooke kept a diary--entries that are both illuminating and fascinating, in a bystander-looking-at-a-car-wreck kind of way. For his health, he experimented with a variety of medicines that his friends and doctors suggested, some of which did more harm than good. Hooke's personal life was also quite tumultuous. Aside from working too much and suffering from insomnia, his relationships with everyone (with the exception of a few close friends like Christopher Wren) were a bust at best. Hooke never married, but he did have an incestuous relationship with his niece. When he died, seemingly destitute, his relatives made off with his savings.
So why did Hooke fall into history's shadow? For one thing, he spread himself too thin by committing himself to many projects. He accomplished much but he never put his energies into one project long enough to yield results he could be solely credited for. Another thing was his temperamental personality. If he hadn't rubbed Newton and his other contemporaries the wrong way, his name would probably still be in the credits.
And finally, what did Hooke look like? Jardine points out a long lost painting that she thinks might be Hooke. I'm not so sure--the man in the painting looks like Malcolm McDowell--based on just the biography, I pictured Hooke to be a bit more stout with more hair and perhaps a petulant look about the eyes.
