Darwin and Darwinism in France before 1900

Abstract

Among the nations with a major scientific tradition in the nineteenth century, France certainly resisted the penetration of Darwin’s evolutionary ideas the most. Darwin himself observed this, in a letter he sent to the French anthropologist Armand de Quatrefages, ten years after the publication of the Origin of Species : It is curious how nationality influences opinion; a week hardly passes without my hearing of some naturalist in Germany who supports my views, and often puts an exaggerated value on my works; whilst in France I have not heard of a single zoologist, except M. Gaudry (and he only partially), who supports my views. But I must have a good many readers as my books are translated. (Darwin 1985–, 18:141, letter, 28 May 1870) Some years later, Ernst Haeckel was more radical. In his popular book, The History of Creation , he insisted on the crucial role of Lamarck in the origins of evolutionary ideas, but observed that, despite this precedent, the French naturalists had simply ignored Darwin: In no civilized country of Europe has Darwin’s doctrine had so little effect and been so little understood as in France, so that in the further course of our examination [i.e., Haeckel’s book] we need not take French naturalists into consideration. (Haeckel 1883, 118)

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