Books by Charles W. J. Withers

This book offers the first full length biography of legendary explorer Mungo Park for over forty years. Tracing the expeditions who followed him it documents how and why he was commemorated long after his death. This is not simply one of the great stories of world exploration but a rich and varied account of Africa and its cultures at the time.

Charles Withers explains how the choice of Greenwich to mark 0 Degrees longitude solved problems of global measurement that had engaged geographers, astronomers, and mariners since ancient times. This history is a testament to the power of maps, the challenges of global measurement, and the role of scientific authority in creating the modern world.

In eighteenth - and nineteenth-century Britain, books of travel and exploration were much more than simply the printed experiences of intrepid authors. This book takes readers on a journey into the nature of exploration.