In 2001, contemporary Australian artist John Wolseley travelled to Indonesia to trace Wallace’s journey nearly 150 years later. He was also fascinated by the detailed and revealing correspondence between Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Darwin. He recreates Wallace’s world, especially the vast differences in plant and animal species, using watercolour.
Wolseley took his paintbox, paper, books, brushes, jars and a good coffee percolator. He also stayed in thatched huts which had changed very little since Wallace’s time. He spent four years travelling between these islands.
The programme includes excerpts are read from Wallace’s memoirs, The Malay Archipelago. It became one of the greatest natural history books of the 19th Century.
Author and ecologist Penny van Oosterzee provides an insight into Wallace’s life. Wallace was made to understand the planet, he didn’t care for social niceties and read whatever he could.
The Wallace Line
Alfred Russel Wallace, aged 31, set sail from Singapore in 1854 for the Malay Archipelago, the least known part of the globe at the time, laden with collection boxes, pins, labels and hand lenses.
His meticulous observations of plant and animal life on these islands led to the naming of The Wallace Line—an invisible line which separates vastly different flora and fauna. Flora and fauna on Bali and Borneo were completely different to those on Lombok and Sulawesi.
He wrote regularly to Darwin about his work in Indonesia. Darwin did not pay too much attention at first as he was too focused on his “big idea”.
Survival of the Fittest
Wallace’s theory—survival of the fittest—was written down between malarial attacks and sent to Darwin.
Darwin made similar discoveries after his return from the Galapagos Islands but personal circumstances prevented him from coming out with his own theories.
Wallace and Darwin’s Joint Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection was presented at the Linnean Society in July 1858.
Wallace was a “free thinker” who didn’t believe in the Bible or God as creator. His theory contradicted prevailing 19th Century views of God shaping and putting all species in their place through creation. Nothing was left to chance.
His ideas either astonished or embarrassed scientists. Church people were outraged. Wallace cared little about who was credited with what, but he was acknowledged by Darwin and welcomed into a select fraternity of naturalists.
Wallace took seven years to document his travels in The Malay Archipelago.
Darwin published his own theory of evolution and became famous whilst Wallace remained in obscurity.
Tracing Wallaceis on ABC Radio National's Hindsight.
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