Review: The Queen's ConjurerEditorial Review - Kirkus ReviewsWoolley (Virtual Worlds and The Bride of Science, neither reviewed) attempts, with fitful success, to rescue from history's shadows an enigmatic Elizabethan astronomer-alchemist. In his time and ours, John Dee (1527–1608) made people uncomfortable. His brilliance extended into a host of areas: amassing an enormous library of rare books and scientific instruments; advocating calendar reform and an English empire; compiling geographical and nautical data for Humphrey Gilbert, Martin Frobisher, Walter Raleigh, and other explorers in preparation for their voyages; even anticipating Isaac Newton's pioneering mathematics. His range of contacts at home and on the continent was extensive, including Queen Elizabeth (who even followed his advice, based on astrological readings, in picking her coronation day). But Dee's dabblings in alchemy and necromancy led to civil and ecclesiastical charges of witchcraft and heresy. After falling under the sway of a spirit medium (the con man Edward Kelley), he lost influence at home, was banished from Bohemia by Emperor Rudolf II, saw his beloved library ransacked, and died in obscurity and penury. Many contemporaries regarded his forays into mysticism as apostasy, while modern scientists are embarrassed by his blurring of the separation between matter and spirit. Although admitting that he fell under Kelley's spell, Woolley skillfully explains that the scientist's straddling the material and the magical represented an attempt to reconnect "an alienated cosmos" split asunder by conflicts between Catholicism and Protestantism, Spain and England, faith and reason. Dee's search for the "Philosopher's Stone," he shows, involved not just a transformation of gold into lead but of the dead into the living. Nevertheless, Woolley's narrative loses focus. His assessment of Dee's scientific achievement is perfunctory given his high claims for it, and he substitutes undigested quotations for pithier explanations. Part Leonardo da Vinci, part Galileo, and part Doctor Faustus, Dee appears as a compelling transitional scientific figure in this useful though flawed biography. User reviewsReview: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Eddy Allen - GoodreadsA fascinating portrait of one of the most brilliant, complex, and colorful figures of the Renaissance. Although his accomplishments were substantial -- he became a trusted confidante to Queen ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Matt Comstock - GoodreadsThis is an historically dense read, almost overwhelming, but overlayed with a very human and tragic plot. Dee was a brilliant renaissance scientist who became obsessed with communicating with angels ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Runedrake - Goodreadsuseful Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Liz Wager - GoodreadsLively insights into a confusion of what we would consider 'real' science (astronomy, physics, etc) and what we now regard as total mumbo jumbo Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Dru - GoodreadsA great biography for those who wish to raise the veil of mystery around this man. Unfortunately it also made him seem petty and selfish. I suppose this is the case for many of the "mysterious ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Julian - GoodreadsExcellent narrative history and biography of genius Elizabethan polymath Dr John Dee. A wildly brilliant man and mind undone by Elizabethan court politics, bad luck and an eventually ruinous ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Luna Ofthenight - GoodreadsDraws the human side of the historical figure. A book rich in history and background detail. I've been fascinated by Dee for years but this is the first biography specifically detailing as much of his ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Rachel - GoodreadsI found this book a fairly good historical read, which attempted to balance a thorough account of Dee's angelic "actions" with the skryer Edward Kelley against an understanding of his place in the ... Read full review Review: The Queen's Conjurer: The Science and Magic of Dr. John Dee, Advisor to Queen Elizabeth IUser Review - Dave Holcomb - GoodreadsInteresting look at a very interesting figure in the history of science -- and pseudo-science -- during the Renaissance, but also a fascinating glimpse of the state of society, religion, and politics in sixteenth-century Europe. Full of surprises. Read full review | User ratings| 5 stars | | | 4 stars | | | 3 stars | | | 2 stars | | | 1 star | |
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