Read as much as you can of what the people he read, read.” Unsurprising for such an approach, the book is characterized by meticulous detail, and there are times when readers may feel a little overwhelmed. In the introduction, Greene explains the advice he was given for writing a scientific biography: “Read everything he wrote. Greene's 600-page biography seeks to place Wegener into his broader scientific context. In telling the story of Wegener's life, Mott T. Somewhat curiously given Wegener's fame for developing the theory of continental drift, this is the first scholarly biography that has been written about him. It was his fourth Arctic expedition in 1930 that brought his life to an early end at the age of fifty-one. Perhaps most significantly, he was also a famed polar explorer, making four trips to Greenland. He was a military reservist, and fought bravely in the First World War.
In his early career as a meteorologist, Wegener made a series of balloon flights, including the longest continuous flight then on record.
The story of his life went beyond pure science, and his wider experiences shaped the way he saw the world. He lived in an age just before specialization became a near requirement for successful scientific careers, and there is something almost quaint about the way he was able to pursue various interests in the different directions they took him. Wegener was an eclectic scientist, with interests ranging from historical astronomy to aerology, the study of lunar craters, and the theory of continental drift for which he became best known. Alfred Wegener was born in Berlin in 1880, and his life in many ways tells the story of the developing earth sciences in the early 20th century.