Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

Connects significant parts of Marconi's biography that have never before been looked at in a single work
The first full, critical, reliable and intellectually sound biography of Marconi that situates him in his time as well as in ours
Utilizes new archival sources and others that have long been inaccessible to researchers

Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

Description

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 R.M.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 with a demonstration of his wireless apparatus in London at the age of 22 in 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, and trailed by the media, which recorded and published nearly every one of his utterances. 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Based on original research and unpublished archival materials in four countries and several languages, Raboy's book is the first to connect significant parts of Marconi's story, from his early days in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 relationships 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.

Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

PART I THE PRODIGY
Chapter One: Bologna: Beginnings
Chapter Two: Priority and Detractors
Chapter Three: London: Start-up
Chapter 4: The Magician
Chapter Five: New York: New Frontiers
Chapter Six: Love and Imperialism
Chapter Seven: The Upstart Technology
Chapter Eight: "The Great Thing"
Chapter Nine: Newfoundland: The World Shrinks
PART II THE PLAYER
Chapter Ten: Corralling the Brand
Chapter Eleven: Regulation
Chapter Twelve: Marriage
Chapter Thirteen: A Life in Litigation
Chapter Fourteen: The Marconi Aura
Chapter Fifteen: A New World Order
Chapter Sixteen: On the Way to Somewhere
Chapter Seventeen: The Perfect Laureate
PART III THE PATRIOT
Chapter Eighteen: The Godsend
Chapter Nineteen: Signals of War
Chapter Twenty: Wireless and Disaster
Chapter Twenty-One: "The Marconi Scandal"
Chapter Twenty-Two: The Invisible Weapon
Chapter Twenty-Three: "L'eroe magico"
Chapter Twenty-Four: The Statesman
Chapter Twenty-Five: The Spark
PART IV THE OUTSIDER
Chapter Twenty-Six: The Master of the House
Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Beam Indenture
Chapter Twenty-Eight: Radio
Chapter Twenty-Nine: The Merger
cc Chapter Thirty: The Anchor
PART V THE CONFORMIST
Chapter Thirty-One: A Servant of the Regime
Chapter Thirty-Two: Science and Fascism
Chapter Thirty-Three: "Your Every Wish Is My Command"
Chapter Thirty-Four: Controlling His Legacy
Chapter Thirty-Five: The Heritage
Chapter Thirty-Six: He Only Cared About Wireless . . .
Postscript
Acknowledgements
Sources and Abbreviations
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

Author Information

Marc Raboy

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

Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

Reviews and Awards

Shortlisted for the Canada Council for theArts 'Governor Generals Literary Award' 2016

"Raboy is especially adroit at portraying how Marconi was swept up in the modern world he helped create." - New York Times

"Marconi really hums when Raboy details how his subject was implicated in the social and political effects of wireless." - New York Times

"Raboy superbly traces every twist and turn of Marconi's life, showing us his influences, business strategies and shrewd management of his own public persona. Raboy skilfully locates his activities in the context of communications policy, the arms race between Britain and Germany, and popular culture" - W. Bernard Carlson, Nature

"a deeply researched and almost all-encompassing biography" - Andrew Robinson, New Scientist

"landmark biography ..." - Dominic Lenton, Engineering & Technology Magazine

"richly detailed and comprehensive biography" - Richard Owen, The Tablet

"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

"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

"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

Marconi

The Man Who Networked the World

Marc Raboy

From Our Blog

15 surprising facts about Guglielmo Marconi, the man behind radio communication

Guglielmo Marconi is popularly known as 'the inventor of radio,' a mischaracterization that critics and supporters of his many rivals are quick to seize upon. Marconi was actually the first person to use radio waves to communicate. His first patent was for 'Improvements in Transmitting Electrical Impulses and Signals and in Apparatus Therefor,' and he considered what he was doing to be a form of wireless telegraphy.

Posted on August 24, 2016

Read the blog post