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JG Crowther and the Making of Interwar British Culture

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JG Crowther and the Making of Interwar British Culture A University of Sussex PhD thesis Available online via Sussex Research Online: http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/ This thesis is protected by copyright which belongs to the author. This thesis cannot be reproduced or quoted extensively from without first obtaining permission in writing from the Author The content must not be changed in any way or sold commercially in any format or medium without the formal permission of the Author When referring to this work, full bibliographic details including the author, title, awarding institution and date of the thesis must be given Please visit Sussex Research Online for more information and further details Interpreting Science JG Crowther and the Making of Interwar British Culture Oliver Hill-Andrews PhD History University of Sussex November 2015 Abstract This thesis examines the place of science in interwar British culture, and challenges central narratives about the shape of interwar British science. Informed by histories of the nineteenth century that critique processes of professionalization and popularization, I argue that characteristics of nineteenth- century science persisted much longer than is commonly assumed. In particular, I show that the boundaries of the scientifc community were still quite fuid, that interpreting science for a broad audience was crucial for the making of science (both in the public sphere and in the scientifc community, at a time of specialization), and that there were attempts to overcome a supposed divide between the sciences and the arts (in cultural productions and personal relations). These arguments are made through an examination of the life and work of J.G. Crowther (1899–1983). Crowther’s life has not yet received extended treatment from historians, but this neglect belies his contemporary importance. Drawing on his extensive archive (and those of his peers) and reviews, I advance the notion of Crowther as a ‘man in the middle’ — he was someone who mediated between practising scientists and the public and between practising scientists of different specializations, positioned himself at the centre of the two cultures, and often found himself in the middle ground politically. As such, he exemplifes the state of the pre-Big Science culture of interwar Britain. Conceptually, I develop the term ‘interpreter’ to refer to Crowther’s role: this term overcomes many of the pitfalls of ‘popularizer’, and shows Crowther in an active role, shaping and re-shaping the meanings of science in the public sphere for his own political and professional ends. It is hoped that, by thinking in terms of ‘interpretation’, historians will be able to develop more sophisticated understandings of the place of science in twentieth century British culture. Acknowledgements Above all, I would like to thank my supervisor, Jim Endersby, for his advice, inspiration and encouragement in the research and writing of this thesis. Thanks also to Hester Barron, and to those who advised me on the state of Crowther scholarship, including Ralph Desmarais, Jane Gregory and Allan Jones. Melinda Baldwin and Boris Jardine kindly let me see their unpublished work. Of my friends, special mention must go to Ben Brown, Matt Crumpler, Luc Guillou, Elliot Gwynne and all the Sussex researchers (past and present). My family — Wendy, Steve and Matthew Hill-Andrews — have supported me throughout my education, in many ways. Finally, without my partner, Heather Macklyne, I’d never have completed this thesis. This dissertation was supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. Contents Acknowledgements 4 Introduction: Science in British Culture, 1900–1945 6 Interpreting Science in the Twentieth Century 18 Rethinking Interwar Culture and Politics 27 I: A Revolutionary Education 35 Making a Marxist 37 Making Socialists? 43 Tiptree Hall 51 Putting a Cow in an Oxo Cube 57 Conclusion 64 II: ‘Not a Research Scientist in the Ordinary Sense’ 67 ‘Living in the Reign of Caesar Augustus’ 69 Serial Publication 81 Conditioning Refexes 93 Conclusion 99 III: The Genres of Scientifc Journalism 102 Science for You 105 Science as a Material for Literature 114 BISRA 121 An Outline of the Universe 127 Conclusion 138 IV: Crowther’s Eminent Scientists 141 Crowther’s Rising Reputation 144 Assassinating British Scientists 157 Looking West 169 Conclusion 182 V: That Changing World 185 A Proper Propaganda for Science 187 Outsider on the Inside 195 Social Relations of Science 203 Conclusion 217 Conclusion: A Life in Science 219 Bibliography 230 Archive Sources 230 Contemporary Periodicals and Newspapers 231 Primary Sources 232 Secondary Sources 236 Introduction Science in British Culture, 1900–1945 In 1936, one of Britain’s most prominent scientists, the Nobel prize-winner Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins (1861–1947), announced the emergence of a ‘form of literature’ that he felt was ‘something new and of an importance which will steadily increase.’ Hopkins was not, he informed those who had gathered to hear his Birkbeck College Foundation Oration, ‘thinking of efforts meant merely to popularise science.’ The literature Hopkins had in mind was produced by ‘very able writers’ who synthesized and assessed ‘the most signifcant aspects of the progress in this or that branch of science’ and did so ‘with accuracy and literary skill.’ While many such books were ‘perhaps at present mostly written for the intelligent lay public’, and therefore counted as popularizations on one level, ‘the best of them are of real value to the specialist.’ That was their real signifcance, since ‘frequent exchanges across the frontiers of knowledge are essential for the symmetrical growth of science’. Hopkins therefore suggested ‘that every encouragement should be given to this form of literature’. At its highest standard, it could be produced ‘only by men with special gifts who are enabled to give all their time to it’, having frst escaped ‘the exacting demands of personal teaching and research.’ However, ‘the world of what we may call offcial science’ was unlikely to recognize ‘those who render [science] this indirect service’ because ‘Honour in that world is won, for the most part, by original research work.’ But these ‘gifted individuals’ had in common with research scientists ‘an inborn sympathy with the nature and aims of science’, only differing in their ‘urge for literary expression rather than for experiment.’ Such people, who chose ‘to devote their lives to wide surveys of scientifc progress and the interpretation of its signifcance for their colleagues who are immersed in specialised researches’, should not be neglected. As use of ‘colleagues’ suggests, Hopkins thought ‘that science should honour them as being among those who really advance it. In these 7 days of specialisation this particular from [sic] of specialisation is surely justifed.’1 By the mid-1930s, Hopkins was a grandee of the scientifc world, and his opinions carried weight. The outline of his career is familiar, as it suggests that the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were a period of discipline formation and professionalization. Described as ‘the founder of modern biochemistry’ by one of his former colleagues, Hopkins was awarded the Nobel Prize for his demonstration of the existence of ‘accessory food factors’ (now known as vitamins), work that he had done around the turn of the century in which he proved that milk contained something not present in a purifed synthetic diet (of carbohydrates, proteins, fats and salts) which enabled his rats to survive and grow. During the First World War, Hopkins continued — this time with the assistance of technicians — to investigate the role of vitamins in nutrition, a pressing concern during food shortages and rationing.2 When the war ended, Hopkins headed a growing biochemistry laboratory in Cambridge: in 1920, he had ten workers, by 1925 he had ffty-nine, and by the middle of the 1920s Hopkins and his colleagues were responsible for almost half of the papers that appeared in the Biochemical Journal. Hopkins also established the frst undergraduate biochemistry course in Britain.3 By 1936, when he addressed Birkbeck College, Hopkins had served as President of the Royal Society, and could add a knighthood and the Order of Merit to his list of honours.4 Many similar stories could be told which show that by the beginning of the twentieth century, most scientists were paid professionals who worked in laboratories, whether in a university, a government research facility, or in industry. New recruits enlisted to the ranks of science were probably from middle-class backgrounds, who had been exposed to science in their school years 1 Frederick Gowland Hopkins, ‘The Pace of Science’, in Joseph Needham (ed.), Hopkins and Biochemistry, 1861–1947: Papers Concerning Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, O.M., P.R.S. (Cambridge, 1949), 298–299 my emphasis. 2 Joseph Needham, ‘Sir Frederick Gowland Hopkins, O.M., F.R.S. (1861–1947)’, Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London, 17 (1962), 117, 142. 3 Robert E. Kohler, From Medical Chemistry to Biochemistry: The Making of a Biomedical Discipline (Cambridge, 1982), 81, 83–84. 4 Needham, ‘Sir Frederick’, 129. 8 thanks to an education system that devoted increasing attention to science, both pure and applied. Laboratory work was well-funded by governments, who expected to beneft practically from research. While the First World War did not create an appreciation of the importance of science and technology overnight, it hastened trends that had started round 1900.5 Increasingly, scientists worked cooperatively, and new disciplines (like biochemistry) and specializations formed, with new journals and societies that excluded those without a formal training in science. Science could only be understood by nonspecialists (if at all) if it was rendered in simplifed language, which inevitably masked the complexities of the knowledge. Specialization bred a sort of cultural tunnel vision on behalf of scientists. The nineteenth-century principle that men of science were cultural leaders who attempted to shape public opinion largely declined as they receded into their laboratories from arenas of public discussion.
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