Simon: Dark Light

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Linda Simon, Dark Light : Electricity and Anxiety from the Telegraph to the X-Ray. Orlando : Harcourt, Inc., 2004. 357 pages, with endnotes, bibliography and index.

Linda Simon is a professor of English at Skidmore College. She has also written a biography of William James, through whom she "bumped into" the topic of electricity and the public reaction to it.

Beginning with the invention of the telegraph, and continuing to the discovery of X-rays and the sometimes lethal effects of X-rays, we get glimpses of personalities who contributed to the discovery and development of electricity.

Some of the people discussed are household names, e.g., Thomas Alva Edison & Marie Curie; others, who may be just as interesting but less well known, are the subject of Ms. Simon's in-depth and rather quirky look into not only electricity, but the phenomenon of public reaction to it.

If Thomas Edison is one of your heroes, you might change your mind about him as a person as you read this work. I certainly did.

This is a fascinating book, full of clever insight, compelling characters, interesting data and sometimes bizarre, not to say macabre, information. The discussion of the public's attitude towards electricity and technology during this time period is particularly well documented and discussed. I've never read anything else quite like this remarkable volume.

-- Notes by SJB