A glorious, sweeping novel of desire, ambition, and the thirst for knowledge, from the # 1 New York Times bestselling author of Eat, Pray, Love and Committed
In The Signature of All Things, Elizabeth Gilbert returns to fiction, inserting her inimitable voice into an enthralling story of love, adventure and discovery. Spanning much of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the novel follows the fortunes of the extraordinary Whittaker family as led by the enterprising Henry Whittaker—a poor-born Englishman who makes a great fortune in the South American quinine trade, eventually becoming the richest man in Philadelphia. Born in 1800, Henry’s brilliant daughter, Alma (who inherits both her father’s money and his mind), ultimately becomes a botanist of considerable gifts herself. As Alma’s research takes her deeper into the mysteries of evolution, she falls in love with a man named Ambrose Pike who makes incomparable paintings of orchids and who draws her in the exact opposite direction—into the realm of the spiritual, the divine, and the magical. Alma is a clear-minded scientist; Ambrose a utopian artist—but what unites this unlikely couple is a desperate need to understand the workings of this world and the mechanisms behind all life.
Exquisitely researched and told at a galloping pace, The Signature of All Things soars across the globe—from London to Peru to Philadelphia to Tahiti to Amsterdam, and beyond. Along the way, the story is peopled with unforgettable characters: missionaries, abolitionists, adventurers, astronomers, sea captains, geniuses, and the quite mad. But most memorable of all, it is the story of Alma Whittaker, who—born in the Age of Enlightenment, but living well into the Industrial Revolution—bears witness to that extraordinary moment in human history when all the old assumptions about science, religion, commerce, and class were exploding into dangerous new ideas. Written in the bold, questing spirit of that singular time, Gilbert’s wise, deep, and spellbinding tale is certain to capture the hearts and minds of readers.
Read an interview with the author HERE.
The Enrichment Program is pleased once again to collaborate with Tattered Cover Book Store on a special one-evening author events. In anticipation of the publication of her newest books this fall, we welcome to the DU campus memoirist/novelist Elizabeth Gilbert, featuring her new novel The Signature of All Things. The presentation concludes with an audience Q&A and a post-program book signing. Each registration includes the featured book.
"Writing fiction was the only aspiration I ever had." ~ Elizabeth Gilbert
Best known for her memoir Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert is a respected writer whose books and articles have earned critical praise. Would you be surprised to learn that Gilbert was a three-time finalist for The National Magazine Award, or that a GQ article she wrote inspired the movie Coyote Ugly? Although she stepped away from fiction writing for several years, Gilbert says she yearned to return to the novel. Join us as we help the multi-award-winning author celebrate the publication of The Signature of All Things, her first novel since 2002. “An extraordinary story of botany, exploration and desire, spanning much of the 19th century,” the novel travels the globe from London to Peru and beyond to tell the story of a brilliant young female scientist whose studies of moss lead her deep into the mysteries of evolution, while the man she loves leads her in the opposite direction, to the magic of the spiritual world. Pre-publicity declares Gilbert’s latest work to be a “big novel, about a big century.”
Sat., 7 pm, Oct. 12, 2013
CRN 1125 / $35*
*Price includes a copy of The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert
You can get more information and can register for the event HERE.
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