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Longitude really does describe the discovery of a means for determining position at seaa challenge that stumped the wisest minds of the world for the better part of two centuries. Many famous scientists, including Galileo, Isaac Newton, and Charles Darwin, appear in the story, but the solution to the longitude problem came from an unknown, self-educated clockmaker, John Harrison, who devoted forty years to the effort.
A surprise New York Times bestseller, Longitude went through twenty-nine hardcover printings and was translated into two dozen foreign languages. Soon after its original 1995 publication it won several literary prizes
Longitude is the dramatic human story of an epic scientific quest. The "longitude problem" was the thorniest dilemma of the eighteenth century. Lacking the ability to measure longitude, sailors throughout the great ages of exploration had been literally lost at sea.
At the heart of Dava Sobel's fascinating brief history of astronomy, navigation and horology stands the figure of John Harrison, self-taught Yorkshire clockmaker, and his forty-year obsession with building the perfect timekeeper. Battling against the establishment, Harrison stood alone in pursuit of his solution and the £20,000 reward offered by Parliament.
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