Mendelism Third Edition

This revised volume offers a clear‑sighted tour of the early days of Mendelian genetics, weaving together the classic pea‑cross experiments with newer studies of rabbits, sheep, butterflies and fowl. The author’s style is conversational, avoiding heavy scholarly footnotes while still presenting the essential patterns of inheritance that reshaped biology. Rich, full‑color plates bring the data to life, letting listeners picture how traits like flower colour or feather texture segregate across generations.

Beyond the laboratory, the book sketches the emerging distinction between genetics—the systematic study of heredity—and eugenics, the social attempt to apply those findings. Drawing on the work of the Cambridge School and its European counterparts, it explains how scientists began to map traits onto chromosomes and why those discoveries mattered to both scientists and the wider public. Listeners will walk away with a solid grounding in the principles that still underpin modern genetics, presented in a style that feels both historic and surprisingly vivid.