This talk was recorded at the 2023 Ilkley Literature Festival. To find out more about the festival, visit our website.

When Charles Darwin arrived in Ilkley in October 1859, he had just finished working on his epochal book On the Origin of Species. After his monumental labours, he looked forward to restoring his body and mind in the Northern home of “the water cure”. But his nine-week visit turned out to be socially and intellectually lively, in ways that illuminate the man and his times, and even the enigmatic illness that plagued him.

In this talk, Mike Dixon and Gregory Radick share new evidence on what Darwin got up to during his stay in the North and what he took away for his future scientific work.