"Remarkable Creatures" Tracy Chevalier

"Mary Anning is a female. She is a spare part."

Out of Lord Henley's mouth in "Remarkable Creatures" by Tracy Chevalier

“What do you believe, Aunt Elizabeth?'

'I believe. . . I am comfortable with reading the Bible figuratively rather than literally. For instance, I think the six days in Genesis are not literal days, but different periods of creation, so that it took many thousands --- or hundreds of thousands of years --- to create. It does not demean God; it simply gives Him more time to build this extraordinary world.'

'And the ichthyosaurus and plesiosaurus?'

'They are creatures from long, long ago. They remind us that the world is changing. Of course it is. I can see it change when there are landslips at Lyme that alter the shoreline. It changes when there are earthquakes and volcanic eruptions and floods. And why shouldn't it?” 

― Tracy Chevalier, Remarkable Creatures

When I first saw the description of this book I assumed it was about spinster sisters who lived a quirky life in a port town on the coast of England.  That in itself would have been enough to interest me, but then I discovered that gender issues, natural history and religion were the main subjects I was even more interested

I was attracted to this book by the author of the "Girl with a Pearl Earring" because of the female characters who were fossil hunters.  "Remarkable Creatures" is an historical novel about the lives of Mary Anning and Elizabeth Philpot, who lived in Lyme-Regis in England, hunted fossils and studied natural history.  At the beginning of the 19th Century, women were not able to publish scientific works, and so these women made paleontological finds that furthered the theory of extinction but were  published by the men in the field instead.

I enjoyed the discussions about science and religion.  In this time before Darwin's work, the Church of England taught that the Earth was around 6000 years old, and the species known were the ones originally created on the fifth day.  Thus, discovery of fossils that belonged to creatures we did not know indicated that species may have become extinct, which would also indicate that God had made mistakes.  Clearly, not a philosophy friendly to church teachings of the time.

The scientific community struggled with this division from the church as well as current scientific theories.  Some believed that certain structures in anatomy were not possible, and according to this fictional telling of the story, some doubted the authenticity of Anning's findings.

Getting to know Mary Anning, and her relationship with Elizabeth Philpot, was entertaining.  Mary was from the working class at a time in English history when class divisions were being intensified.  That her family were religious dissenters added to the problem, as member of churches, like the Congregationalists, were legally discriminated against.  Elizabeth lived with her three sisters, and as the unmarried sisters of a London solicitor they had a comfortable annual income but were considered eccentric by Lyme-Regis denizens.

However, the book moved away from science and religion and became a fictional soap opera of the relationship between Anning and Philpot and possibly rivalries between them based on love and class.  I have since done some research on the two of them, and the scientific story was altered to fit the story, as well as the chronology of events of their lives.  Although an attractive story, nonetheless, I could have lived without the contrived drama between the two women and would have been content with the telling of their lives no matter how sedate.