The Bride of Science: Romance, Reason and Byron's Daughter - Softcover

Woolley, Benjamin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1447272544 ISBN 13: 9781447272540

Publisher: Pan, 2015

Synopsis

Ada Lovelace, the daughter of Lord Byron was born in 1815 just after the Battle of Waterloo, and died aged 36, soon after the Great Exhibition of 1851. She was connected with some of the most influential and colourful characters of the age: Charles Dickens, Michael Faraday, Charles Darwin and Charles Babbage. It was her work with Babbage that led to her being credited with the invention of computer programming and to her name being adopted for the programming language that controls the US military machine.

Ada personified the seismic historical changes taking place over her lifetime. This was the era when fissures began to open up in culture: romance split away from reason, instinct from intellect, art from science. Ada came to embody these new polarities and her life heralded a new era: the machine age.

Reissued to coincide with the bicentenary of Ada's birth, The Bride of Science is a fascinating examination of an extraordinary life offering devastating insight into the seemingly unbridgeable gulf between art and science, the consequences of which are still with us today.

About this title

About the Author

Benjamin Woolley is an author and broadcaster whose work covers subjects ranging from the origins of virtual reality to the history of colonial America. His books have been translated into German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese and Chinese, and his documentaries broadcast across the world.

From the Back Cover

Byron's daughter, Ada Lovelace, was born in 1815 just after the Battle of Waterloo, and died aged only thirty-six, soon after the Great Exhibition of 1851. Her life embodies the seismic changes then taking place. This was the era in which romance split away from reason, instinct from intellect and art from science. But in contrast to her poet father, Ada's passion was for mathematics and her pioneering work with Charles Babbage has rightly led to her being credited with the invention of computer programming.

Benjamin Woolley's acclaimed biography is a fascinating examination of Ada's remarkable life, and affords devastating insight into the seemingly unbridgeable gulf between art and science, the consequences of which are still with us two centuries after her death.

'Absorbing, meticulous and beautifully written' Independent on Sunday

'Enthralling' Sunday Times

'Woolley has a great story to tell and does it with racy vigour' Daily Telegraph

Edition details

• Publisher: Pan
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1447272544
• ISBN 13: 9781447272540
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 432