In the chilling case of the volcanic 1810’s, the global ocean-atmospheric system had not recovered from the cooling effect of the 1809 Unknown event when the colossal eruption of Tambora occurred. The aftermath of this eruption, spanning the second half of the decade stands as the most catastrophic sustained weather crisis of the millennium.
From this jumping-off point, Gillen D’Arcy Wood explores a wide range of events precipitated by the eruption of Tambora in April of 1815 and not only in the immediate area of destruction in the East Indies, but across the globe. Exhaustively researched and annotated, with a plethora of graphs and photos, this book was a tough slog for me. While it was broken up in chapters with largely geographical focus, the narrative jumped around quite a bit from scientific data and analysis of connections to social upheaval to musings on how the climate affected art. It’s a rather nimble mind that can make all those associations and I’m afraid I stumbled (a lot) trying to keep up. I don’t think that is so much the fault of the author and I’m not sorry I read this. There was some really entertaining stuff, and not just about the Shelley Circle and the influence of that stormy summer in Geneva in 1816 on literature but also the painting of J. M.W. Turner, and the Chinese poet Li Yuyang. Even in descriptions of pictures were little nuggets unearthing the wide, wide range of this authors breadth of knowledge. I came to wish that this book was actually a series on PBS or one of the big cable channels so that so much of this information could be brought more fully to life. Or maybe I’m just lazy.