SOURCE: Tobin, Allan J. “Evolutions That Never Evolved.” Los Angeles Times Book Review (29 October 1989): 1.

In the following review, Tobin argues that Wonderful Life is not as accessible as it could be because of Gould's intrusive presence in the text.

Stephen Jay Gould's new book, Wonderful Life, recounts two fascinating and previously little-known stories, one about evolution and the other about evolutionary science. The first concerns the relationships between present life on our planet and a set of strange and ancient animals. The second, told as a five-act drama, recounts how three British scientists came to understand these relationships. Gould ranks the work of his paleontological colleagues among the greatest creative achievement of our species, comparable, in his view, to the cave paintings of Lascaux or the cathedral windows of Chartres. Gould goes on to reflect on the importance of contingency in evolutionary history and of concept in evolutionary...