Felipe Fernandez-Armesto
Crops and Cavemen
After The Ice: A Global Human History, 20,000-5,000 BC
By Steven Mithen
Weidenfeld & Nicolson 622pp £25 order from our bookshop
JOHN LUBBOCK WAS the Richard Dawkins of his day. He was one of Darwin’s earliest and closest adherents, and set himself up as an ‘expositor of science’ and ‘mentor to the general public’. Of all the great range of hs polymathic works whch crowded the shelves of booksellers, none was more influential than Prehistoric Times (1865). In it he propounded a cultural counterpart of the theory of evolution: Tasmanians and Fuegians were ‘to the antiquary what the opossum and the sloth’ were to biologists – throwbacks to an earlier phase, living evidence (albeit doomed to extinction) of the antiquity of humankind and of the savagery of archaic humans. Despite his revulsion fiom ‘rude’ humanity, Lubbock remained a liberal and a philanthropist: he took the title of Lord Avebury fiom the site of the famous megaliths, which he saved for the nation by purchasing them when they were due for demolition.
Sign Up to our newsletter
Receive free articles, highlights from the archive, news, details of prizes, and much more.@Lit_Review
Follow Literary Review on Twitter
'Thirkell was a product of her time and her class. For her there are no sacred cows, barring those that win ribbons at the Barchester Agricultural.'
The novelist Angela Thirkell is due a revival, says Patricia T O'Conner (£).
https://literaryreview.co.uk/good-gad
'Only in Britain, perhaps, could spy chiefs – conventionally viewed as masters of subterfuge – be so highly regarded as ethical guides.'
https://literaryreview.co.uk/the-spy-who-taught-me
In this month's Bookends, @AdamCSDouglas looks at the curious life of Henry Labouchere: a friend of Bram Stoker, 'loose cannon', and architect of the law that outlawed homosexual activity in Britain.
https://literaryreview.co.uk/a-gross-indecency