Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World

by Marc Raboy

Overview

A little over a century ago, the world went wireless. Cables and all their limiting inefficiencies gave way to a revolutionary means of transmitting news and information almost everywhere, instantaneously. By means of "Hertzian waves," as radio waves were initially known, ships could now make contact with other ships (saving lives, such as on the doomed S.S. Titanic); financial markets could coordinate with other financial markets, establishing the price of commodities and fixing exchange rates; military commanders could connect with the front lines, positioning artillery and directing troop movements. Suddenly and irrevocably, time and space telescoped beyond what had been thought imaginable. Someone had not only imagined this networked world but realized it: Guglielmo Marconi.

As Marc Raboy shows us in this enthralling and comprehensive biography, Marconi was the first truly global figure in modern communications. Born to an Italian father and an Irish mother, he was in many ways stateless, working his cosmopolitanism to advantage. Through a combination of skill, tenacity, luck, vision, and timing, Marconi popularized—and, more critically, patented—the use of radio waves. Soon after he burst into public view at the age of 22 with a demonstration of his wireless apparatus in London, 1896, he established his Wireless Telegraph & Signal Company and seemed unstoppable. He was decorated by the Czar of Russia, named an Italian Senator, knighted by King George V of England, and awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics—all before the age of 40. Until his death in 1937, Marconi was at the heart of every major innovation in electronic communication, courted by powerful scientific, political, and financial interests. He established stations and transmitters in every corner of the globe, from Newfoundland to Buenos Aires, Hawaii to Saint Petersburg.

Based on original research and unpublished archival materials in four countries and several languages, Raboy's book is the first to connect significant parts of Marconi's story, from his early days in Italy, to his groundbreaking experiments, to his protean role in world affairs. Raboy also explores Marconi's relationshps with his wives, mistresses, and children, and examines in unsparing detail the last ten years of the inventor's life, when he returned to Italy and became a pillar of Benito Mussolini's fascist regime. Raboy's engrossing biography, which will stand as the authoritative work of its subject, proves that we still live in the world Marconi created.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190905934
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	11/01/2018
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	872
Sales rank:	507,006
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.20(h) x 1.90(d)

About the Author

Marc Raboy is Beaverbrook Professor Emeritus in Ethics, Media, and Communications in the Department of Art History and Communication Studies at McGill University.

Table of Contents

Prologue: Marconi in His Time and Ours

PART I The Prodigy
Chapter 1: Bologna: Beginnings
Chapter 2: Priority and Detractors
Chapter 3: London: Start-up
Chapter 4: The Magician
Chapter 5: New York: New Frontiers
Chapter 6: Love and Imperialism
Chapter 7: The Upstart Technology
Chapter 8: "The Great Thing"
Chapter 9: Newfoundland: The World Shrinks

PART II The Player
Chapter 10: Corralling the Brand
Chapter 11: Regulation
Chapter 12: Marriage
Chapter 13: A Life in Litigation
Chapter 14: The Marconi Aura
Chapter 15: A New World Order
Chapter 16: On the Way to Somewhere
Chapter 17: The Perfect Laureate

PART III The Pat Riot
Chapter 18: The Godsend
Chapter 19: Signals of War
Chapter 20: Wireless and Disaster
Chapter 21: "The Marconi Scandal"
Chapter 22: The Invisible Weapon
Chapter 23: "L'eroe magico"
Chapter 24: The Statesman
Chapter 25: The Spark

PART IV The Outsider
Chapter 26: The Master of the House
Chapter 27: The Beam Indenture
Chapter 28: Radio
Chapter 29: The Merger
Chapter 30: The Anchor

PART V The Conformist
Chapter 31: A Servant of the Regime
Chapter 32: Science and Fascism
Chapter 33: "Your Every Wish Is My Command"
Chapter 34: Controlling His Legacy
Chapter 35: The Heritage
Chapter 36: He Only Cared About Wireless . . .

Postscript
Acknowledgements
Sources and Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Marc Raboy is an observant and sure-footed guide..."—Mary K. MacLeod, Metascience

"[A]n informative, readable, and pleasurable account that will provide abundant insights into Marconi's life...[T]his book represents a remarkable, balanced contribution to the understanding of a seminal figure in the history of the modern world...Recommended."—CHOICE

"Finally, the comprehensive, rounded, readable and deeply researched biography of Marconi that so significant a figure of change deserves. It is an elegant, ambitious, and brilliant treatment of an elegant, ambitious, and brilliant figure."—Monroe E. Price, Director, Center for Global Communications Studies, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania

"Marconi is a tour de force, revealing the fascinating history of one of the most influential figures in the history of modern technology and the communications revolution. Employing a wide range of archival sources, Raboy crafts a highly readable story of a man who is at times heroic, at times a cad. He is unflinching in exposing the major role Marconi played in support of Mussolini's Fascist regime."—David Kertzer, author of The Pope and Mussolini, Winner of the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Biography

"Like the networked world that he imagined, Marconi was both complicated and elusive. Raboy's compelling and comprehensive biography places the inventor and entrepreneur at the origin of today's debates about communications, corporations, and capitalism."—W. Patrick McCray, Professor of History, University of California at Santa Barbara

"An obvious labor of love, this is the definitive biography of Marconi. Elegantly written and exhaustively researched, Marconi is an extremely impressive and deeply nuanced exploration of the inventor, the man, and the ongoing importance of his legacy."—Susan J. Douglas, University of Michigan; author of Listening In: Radio and the American Imagination

"Marc Raboy's book is by far the most comprehensive rendering of Marconi's life and times I have seen. Drawing on numerous and in some cases only recently available resources, Marconi's story is re-told in vivid terms and contemporary context."—Vint Cerf, Internet Pioneer

"Rescuing his subject from hagiography, Marc Raboy gives us the first real account of Marconi's vital role as the wizard of wireless, industry developer, and consummate political insider. Raboy's impeccably researched biography will help guide histories of global media in the years ahead. A superb work of scholarship."—Dwayne Winseck, School of Journalism and Communication, Carleton University

"A comprehensive portrait of a complicated man, Raboy's meticulous, judicious work merits anchorage on science-history shelves."—Booklist, Starred Review

"[Raboy] is especially adroit at portraying how Marconi was swept up in the modern world he helped create...Marconi really hums when Raboy details how his subject was implicated in the social and political effects of wireless...Marconi, which functions as a cultural history as much as a biography, reminds us that in its earliest incarnations, wireless had a romance and mystique."—New York Times

"Mr. Raboy's book is a rock-solid, archivally based, professional work of history and surely one of the year's better biographies."—Paul Kennedy, Wall Street Journal

"Professor Raboy is to be congratulated on producing this definitive biography that deserves a very wide readership."—David Harris, Radio User

From the Publisher

…[Raboy] is especially adroit at portraying how Marconi was swept up in the modern world he helped create…Marconi, which functions as a cultural history as much as a biography, reminds us that in its earliest incarnations, wireless had a romance and mystique.

The New York Times Book Review - Greg Milner