THE LAST MAN WHO KNEW EVERYTHING:--Andrew Robinson. A biography with a definite scientific bent about Thomas Young, who was described in the Preface. “Not only did he make pioneering contributions to physics (the wave theory of light) and engineering (the modulus of elasticity), to physiology (the mechanism of vision) and to Egyptology (the decipherment of the hieroglyphs), but he was also a distinguished physician, a major scholar of ancient Greek, a phenomenal linguist, and an authoritative writer on all manner of other subjects, from carpentry and music to life insurance and ocean tides.” Of many of those subjects there are his writings and often those of his detractors. Young's quote on P 183 is highly instructive about the man: “Scientific investigations are a sort of warfare, carried on on predecessors; I have often gained a signal victory when I have been half asleep, but more frequently found, on being thoroughly awake, that the enemy had still the advantage of me when I thought I had him fast in a corner—and all this, you see, keeps one alive.” Interesting book about a fascinating man; not a gossipy book, but one dealing with Young's learning and continued questioning. Not an easy novel to read, but, in the end, worthwhile.