Sir Richard Owen Character Analysis in Your Inner Fish

The leading anatomist in the mid-1800s, who gathered and classified thousands of animal specimens from Africa, contributed to the discovery of fossils in England, and pioneered the field of comparative anatomy with his study of exotic creatures. Owen saw the essential similarity of animal limbs as a sign of Divine Order in creation.

Sir Richard Owen Quotes in Your Inner Fish

The Your Inner Fish quotes below are all either spoken by Sir Richard Owen or refer to Sir Richard Owen. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Similarities Between All Animals Theme Icon

). Note: all page numbers and citation info for the quotes below refer to the Vintage Books edition of Your Inner Fish published in 2009.

Some fish, then, had structures like those in a limb. Owen's archetype was not a divine and eternal part of all life. It had a history, and that history was to be found in Devonian age rocks…

Related Characters: (speaker),

Page Number and Citation: 33

Explanation and Analysis:

Sir Richard Owen Character Timeline in Your Inner Fish

The timeline below shows where the character Sir Richard Owen appears in Your Inner Fish. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Sir Richard Owen , one of the most famous anatomists of the 1800s, also believed in a divine... (full context)

...and incus bones gradually moved from the jaw in reptiles to the ear in mammals. Richard Owen , the anatomist, then appears again, this time cataloguing small dog-sized reptiles found in South... (full context)