 First edition cover | |
| Author | Richard Dawkins |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Subject | Evolutionary biology |
| Published | 2003 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin) |
| Publication place | United Kingdom |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 264 pp. |
| ISBN | 0-618-33540-4 |
| OCLC | 52269209 |
| 500 21 | |
| LC Class | QH366.2 .D373 2003 |
| Preceded by | Unweaving the Rainbow |
| Followed by | The Ancestor's Tale |
A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love is a 2003 book of selected essays and other writings byRichard Dawkins. Published five years after Dawkins's previous bookUnweaving the Rainbow, it contains essays covering subjects includingpseudoscience,genetic determinism,memetics,terrorism,religion andcreationism. A section of the book is devoted to Dawkins' late adversaryStephen Jay Gould.
The book's title is a reference to a quotation ofCharles Darwin, in a letter toJ.D. Hooker dated 13 July 1856, made in reference to Darwin's lack of belief in how "a perfect world" wasdesigned by God (and a reference to ReverendRobert Taylor):"What a book a devil's chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering low and horridly cruel works of nature!"[1][2][3]
Robin McKie reviewed the book forThe Observer and stated that the book contained a mixture of touching essays and "the good, old knockabout stuff at which Dawkins excels".[4]
