Table of Contents
EVOLUTION IN POEMS
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Selected by Mary Ann Hoberman and Linda Winston, The Tree That Time Built (Sourcebooks Jabberwocky, 2009) is a 200+-page science-and-nature-themed poetry collection by a wide range of poets, among them X.J. Kennedy, Theodore Roethke, Emily Dickinson, Douglas Florian, Maxine Kumin, and T.S. Eliot. Several deal with the topic of evolution. See, for example, Bobbi Katz’s “Journal Jottings of Charles Darwin.” Included with the book is an audio CD. For ages 7 and up. |
| Langdon’s Smith’s bouncy poem Evolution – which begins “When you were a tadpole and I was a fish/In the Paleozoic time” – doesn’t quite have the science down, but gets the general idea. Hear it read by Jean Shepherd on YouTube. | |
| Also see Lorine Niedecker’s Darwin and C.S. Lewis’s Evolutionary Hymn. |
EVOLUTION AT THE MOVIES
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In Evolution (2001), a pair of college professors and a gorgeous government scientist (played by Julianne Moore) battle a dangerous and rapidly evolving organism that has arrived on Earth inside a meteor. Rated PG-13. |
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In Creation (2009), a tortured Charles Darwin struggles to complete On the Origin of Species, while torn between his own science and the religious beliefs of his wife. Rated PG-13. |
| See Documentaries on Evolution and Big History for a rated annotated list. | |
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By the incomparable David Attenborough, Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life is an excellent hour-long documentary on evolution. Also by Attenborough, see the mini-series First Life (2010) about the origin of life on Earth. |
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In Annihilation (2018), a team of scientists enters an area known as the Shimmer where, following a meteor strike, evolution has run amok. Sci-fi horror. Rated R. |