The Royal Society was founded in 1660 and the place it holds in literary and popular culture has evolved over time. Here I will focus on the nineteenth century as a time of transition for the Royal Society, its Fellows and society’s attitude towards science itself; coming at a time when print media was increasingly accessible. I will examine the way in which the Fellows shaped this new attitude towards science through their writing and the ways in which they both engaged the public attention while, often simultaneously, making it more difficult for the non-scientist to engage with them.

Many of the Society’s Fellows were instrumental in the promotion of popular science and the professionalization of science. The influence of literature enabled them to communicate better, making their writing and their lectures more accessible and more engaging to a wide audience. However, the same scientists were making science a closed subject by the sheer breadth of their investigations. Scientific language was often nigh impenetrable, and there is a tangible difference in the way scientists wrote for a general audience and for a purely scientific audience. Nowhere is this more evident than in the Society’s primary scientific publication, the Philosophical Transactions, and by comparing the works published here with popular science writing by Fellows on the same subjects, we can see the difficulties posed in this alliance.

The influence on literature is difficult to trace, especially considering there do not seem to have been very many direct links between the Royal Society and literary figures. The topics written about in the Philosophical Transactions, though, would have filtered through to popular culture and become apparent in literature. Here I will trace briefly the path of chemistry through the Philosophical Transactions, into popular understanding and through to literature; whether it has been accurately portrayed or manipulated in some way, and indeed, if the way the topics were used in literature impacted on their presentation in the publications of the Royal Society.

The Royal Society and its Fellows were instrumental in creating a closed book in the exponentially expanding language of science, whilst simultaneously seeking to spread knowledge. Some topics were more popular for audiences and writers than others – but was this due to the Society, its Fellows or the taste of the author; and how far did the influence extend both ways?