It is 1858. Charles Darwin struggles to finish The Origin of Species, and give the world his theory of natural selection, while coping with family illness and his own loss of faith. Meanwhile, halfway around the world, an unknown explorer is about to come up with the exact same theory. Both vibrantly comic and deeply moving, Trumpery examines what it means to live in a Darwinian universe from the point-of-view of the man who discovered the idea.