Lord Bronowski was known not primarily as a mathematician or scientist but as a
communicator of science and a
humanist. He was a regular panelist on
The Brains Trust in the 1950s. His books include
Science and Human Values (1953),
Common Sense of Science,
Origin of Knowledge and Imagination and of course the book of the thing that made him most famous: the 1974
television series
The Ascent of Man, which has a strong claim to be the best work ever created for television. While arguing strongly for
scientific values and
understanding, he insisted on the
tolerance and
humility essential to them.
The final moments of the The Ascent of Man are in the mud of a concentration camp. Bronowski lets it slip through his fingers. The screen fades to black.
He was born in Poland on 18 January 1908. He and his family fled to Germany when Russia invaded Poland, then to England in 1920, where he studied at Cambridge. He was a student with William Empson, working on a magazine Experiment with him, and himself wrote poetry. He never felt a sharp divide between literature and science: he called them two languages. He stayed for a while in 1933 in Majorca near Robert Graves and Laura Riding. He later published a book on William Blake.
Bronowski married the sculptor Rita Coblentz (working name Rita Colin) in 1941 and had four daughters. They lived in the Hexagon in Fitzroy Park, Highgate. He died in 1974, and is buried in the western half of Highgate Cemetery. He is marked with a small slab:
JACOB BRONOWSKI
1908-1974