Jad J. The Origin and Development of Evolutionary Ideas (Vozniknovenie i razvitie idei evolyutsii), 1924. In Russian

Дж. Джэд
Возникновение и развитие идей эволюции.
Пер. с англ. Н. Зверинского, под ред. Н. Бобринского.
Серия: Природа и культура; Кн. 8.
Москва: Государственное издательство, 1924.
112 с.; 23 см. Твердый владельческий переплет.
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J. Jad
The Origin and Development of Evolutionary Ideas (Vozniknovenie i razvitie idei evolyutsii).
Translated from English by N. Zverinsky, edited by N. Bobrinsky.
Series: Nature and Culture; Book 8.
Moscow: State Publishing House, 1924.
112 pp.; 23 cm. Hardcover (owner’s binding).

This 1924 Moscow edition is a rare early Soviet popular science translation of a concise British overview of evolutionary thought, published in the “Nature and Culture” series aimed at broad self-education during the NEP period. The book traces the historical emergence and development of evolutionary ideas from ancient philosophers (Anaximander, Empedocles) through medieval and Renaissance thinkers to the 18th–19th centuries, covering precursors such as Buffon, Erasmus Darwin, Lamarck, Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, and culminating in Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection and its immediate reception.
The translation was done by Nikolai Zverinsky (a Soviet biologist and translator of scientific literature) and edited by Nikolai Bobrinsky (1884–1965), a prominent Soviet zoologist, ornithologist, and evolutionary biologist, professor at Moscow University, and specialist in mammal systematics and biogeography. Bobrinsky’s editorial work likely added notes and context to align the text with early Soviet materialist interpretations of evolution, emphasizing its scientific and anti-religious significance.
Issued by the State Publishing House (Gosizdat) in a modest run of 4,000 copies, this slim volume reflects the 1920s Soviet enthusiasm for popularizing Darwinism and natural science amid campaigns against religion and for scientific literacy. It is a valuable artifact of early Soviet evolutionary popular literature, the reception of Darwinism in the USSR during the 1920s, and the “Nature and Culture” series of educational booklets.