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The Feynman Challenge – science poems with a cosmic range

By James Thornton

Category: All Books, Poetry

Formats available: Paperback, Ebook

Pages: 136

Publication date: 07/11/23

ISBN-13: 9781909954892

“James Thornton speaks as both a poet who has colonized science and a scientist who speaks a poetic tongue.”  –  E.O Wilson

A poetry collection that leads the reader into the wonders of scientific discovery and the intricacies of the natural world.

The collection’s title? Richard Feynman, the 20th Century’s most dashing physicist, set poets a challenge: Science is not just mystery but truth, and they should tackle it. From the mating of sea slugs to the discovery of gravity waves, The Feynman Challenge sees James Thornton focus poetry on the realms of science and environment. Poems are sourced with the scientific articles and papers whose narratives and wonders they explore, to help readers whose interest is spiked to travel further.

The collection opens with James’s essay examining the interplay of science, poetry and the natural world, from Lucretius to now.

THE FEYNMAN CHALLENGE  launches in the USA and CA on 7th November 2023.

Reviews

‘This is a generous book, happy to serve the curiosity, the wonder and humility of science, happening here and there in words that simply send a shudder -Two black holes are about / to marry, a billion years ago - through our sense of time and space.’

- Philip Gross, winner of the T.S.Eliot Prize

“In this unusual and exceptionally interesting work, James Thornton speaks as both a poet who has colonized science and a scientist who speaks a poetic tongue.”  

- Edward O. Wilson, University Professor Emeritus, Harvard University

James Thornton

“James Thornton is an environmental hero of the highest order. James’s extraordinary book Nature, My Teacher is captivating, mesmerising, and manages to capture so beautifully our true relationship with the natural world. This is a hugely important book.” –  Ben Goldsmith, author of God is an Octopus “James Thornton speaks as both a poet who has colonised science and a scientist who speaks a poetic tongue.” – E.O. Wilson ‘One of ten people who could change the world’ – The New Statesman Born in Douglaston, New York, James’s life had …

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For 25 years James Thornton has spent a good portion of each year nestled in a  Pyrenean mountain village. Like the house martins that flock to the valley, it was part of his migratory journey. Each year, he observed the flow of villagers and the natural world and wrote what …