The Discoverers: A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself

Daniel Boorstin's book The Discoverers is an ode to human curiosity and creativity, with a specific focus on the great scientists, explorers, and intellectuals of primarily Western history:

My hero is Man the Discoverer. The world we now view from the literate West — the vistas of time, the land and the seas, the heavenly bodies and our own bodies, the plants and animals, history and human societies past and present — had to be opened for us by countless Columbuses. In the deep recesses of the past, they remain anonymous. As we come closer to the present they emerge into the light of history, a cast of characters as varied as human nature. Discoveries become episodes of biography, unpredictable as the new worlds the discoverers opened to us. 

Boorstin's historical study is conventional, conservative and individualistic — but also thrilling.