Dinomania

At once reptilian and avian, dinosaurs enable us to imagine a world far beyond the usual boundaries of time, culture, and physiology. We have envisioned them in diverse and contradictory ways, reflecting, in part, our changing conceptions of ourselves.

Their discovery, around the start of the nineteenth century, was intimately tied to our awareness of geological time; their vast size and power called to mind railroads, battleships, and factories, making dinosaurs, paradoxically, emblems of modernity. At the same time, their world was nature at its most pristine, and they simultaneously symbolised childhood innocence and wonder.

Dinosaurs provided a sort of code that has enabled people to speak indirectly about the possibility of our own extinction. Not unlike humans today, dinosaurs seem both powerful—almost godly—and helpless in the face of cosmic forces even mightier than themselves.

Dinomania by Boria Sax offers a fascinating exploration of these contradictions, delving into how our perceptions of these incredible creatures reveal as much about us as they do about the prehistoric world.