★ Short-listed for the 2025 Prosveshcheniye Prize in natural science.
★ Why, 140 years after his death, is Darwin still the scientist most worshipped and most hated? Why is he so “missed”? How did a scientific theory become a social, cultural, and political battlefield for 140 years? What does it mean to live in “Darwin’s universe”?
★ A unique “posthumous biography” of Darwin, a “fantastical drift” of his idea, a deeply relevant history of thought! It recounts how “Darwinism” was contested, distorted, utilised, and renewed after its creator’s death.
★ More than 30 black-and-white illustrations vividly assist readers in understanding the century-long journey of the idea.
★ The book is a mirror: by showing the fantastical drift of “Darwinism” over a century and a half, it reflects the eternal tension between science, society, and human nature, teaching readers how great ideas are shaped and alienated in transmission, thereby cultivating critical thinking about information.
★ For curious, reflective readers: appealing both to fans of history of science and evolutionary biology and to those interested in social trends, ideology, and public debate.

No matter who compiles a list of the most famous scientists of all time, Darwin’s name is always prominent. This scientist changed humanity’s understanding of nature, life on Earth, and ourselves once and for all. Yet the name of this genius researcher, scientific prophet, and revolutionary still disturbs minds today, evoking unlimited reverence as well as fierce anger and hatred. Darwin has become like a “dead lion”, but people keep “whipping” him. Some seek to protect his scientific heritage, others use his name to promote their own views (for example, social Darwinism defending inequality). The vivid image of a “dead lion” is the central metaphor of Maxim Vinarsky’s book, which is devoted to writing a unique “posthumous biography” of Darwin. Because, just as a person’s life continues in how they are remembered, so a scientist’s biography is constantly rewritten with the fate of his intellectual legacy. This raises the core question: why, 140 years after his death, is Darwin still the scientist most discussed, most cited, and most controversial across eras and nations? To answer, the book embarks on an “intellectual time travel” that began in April 1882 and continues into our age of the Internet and neural networks. It meticulously traces how perceptions of Darwin and his ideas have evolved, and how later generations— not always disinterestedly—distorted, exploited, or even falsified his thought. It recounts both the creation of natural-selection theory and its survival amid fierce attacks, remaining to this day one of the most influential scientific theories. At the same time, the book shuttles through many fascinating but little-known scientific corners: from genomic catastrophes and mass extinctions to the origin of death and the benefits of aggression; from why evolution cannot create eight-legged horses or winged toads, to the gluttony of cuckoos and the laws of human forgetting… The author, a professional biologist who has studied Darwin’s life and works for many years, offers his own answer to why it was Darwin’s theory that forever changed humanity’s understanding of itself, its origins, and its place in the world. Ultimately, the book tries to lead readers to explore: what does it mean to live in “Darwin’s universe”?

【Author】Maxim Vinarsky
Doctor of Biological Sciences, professor at St Petersburg State University, head of the Laboratory of Macro-ecology and Biogeography of Invertebrates, lead researcher at the St Petersburg branch of the S. I. Vavilov Institute for the History of Science and Technology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. His main research fields include invertebrate zoology, history of zoology, and evolutionary theory.