Hostage to Fortune: The Troubled Life of Francis Bacon

This book is in many ways superb. The writing is smooth, the judgments intelligently based on evidence, the archival research prodigious. But it leaves one with oddly little sense of Bacon the man. Partly that's because the authors don't speculate, confining themselves to the historical record. That's a great virtue, but it also means we never get a sense of Bacon's relations with his wife, or even his sexuality. We hear about his chronically poor health, but not what his symptoms suggest to a modern doctor. Also, the authors don't examine Bacon's writings in any sort of detail. This is definitely a "life and times", not a "life and letters." The authors rarely step back to give an overall picture. There are no scene-setting panoramas, no authorial intrusions to explain why, for example, they decided to go into such detail about the activities of Bacon's brother Anthony. One gathers that the authors believe Anthony and Francis were working closely together, but I would have liked to have their thinking explained more fully. (Although Anthony is practically the main character of the first quarter of the book, his death is mentioned only in passing.) These criticisms reflect my occasional irritation with the book, but they don't detract from the authors' tremendous achievement. If the authors had included everything I missed, the book would have been quite a bit fatter, and that would have been a negative, too. As it is, the book is (just barely) small enough to be read without risk of injury, unlike so many other modern biographies. The book contains a great deal about Bacon's political activities, as another reviewer has noted. That's because a great deal of Bacon's life was occupied with political activities. If all you want to read about is Bacon's scientific works, you shouldn't read a biography of their author. In the case of Isaac Newton, there is practically no difference between the life and the scientific work. But in Bacon's case, there is not only a difference but a dichotomy. He was a successful lawyer and politician who also happened to kick-start the Scientific Revolution. To summarize, Hostage to Fortune provides all the details, but not the outline. My advice would be to familiarize yourself with the basic course of Bacon's life and his achievements before reading this book, so you can fully appreciate its richness.

While the book starts slowly with what seems to be an overly detailed account of Bacon's family and their activities, it is a clear headed and balanced account of a man who achieved fame across the centuries, as well as in his own time---but never great virtue, character or happiness in his own life. It is quite readable, and even engrossing in the second half. Scholars will appreciate the careful documentation and extensive reference to sources and supporting materials.