"Jagadis Chandra Bose (1858-1937) was India's first scientist to receive international recognition. Working in almost complete isolation in Calcutta in the heyday of the Raj, Bose did pioneering research, first in physics and then in physiology. As a physicist, he was the first to produce millimetre-length radio waves and study their properties. In biology, he was a brilliant inventor of instruments which he used to perform delicate experiments on plant life. However, his theories about the relationship between living and non-living matter, and the responsiveness of plants to stimuli, were highly controversial in his time, to the extent that he invoked both warm admiration and intense dislike, even ridicule, amongst his peers in Europe and America." "This book is the first comprehensive, critical study of Bose's science and philosophy of nature, and of his complex, wayward genius."--Jacket