The Elements of Marie Curie

The discovery of two new elements—polonium, named for her homeland, and radium with its strange powers—brought the Polish-born Marie Sklodowska Curie to the world’s attention in 1898. Both elements were “radioactive,” a term she coined to describe their unusual behavior.  

 

As radioactivity reshaped physics and chemistry in the early 20th century, Mme. Curie met regularly with a coterie of scientists, including her friend Albert Einstein. For decades she stood out at international conferences as the only woman in the room. Meanwhile she made room in her laboratory between 1906 and 1933 for more than forty aspiring female scientists. During the First World War, she drove her personally outfitted mobile X-ray units to combat zones accompanied by her seventeen-year-old daughter, Irène. Together they trained some 150 French women as X-ray technicians. After Irène completed her university studies, she followed her mother into the lab and won her own Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1935.

 

REVIEWS

“The Elements of Marie Curie is much more than a biography. It is a tribute to a woman who redefined what was possible for women in science, inspiring generations to follow her. Sobel’s elegant prose and thoughtful use of personal and historical accounts bring Curie to life, offering a nuanced portrait of a woman whose contributions to science were matched by quiet strength, humility and commitment to humanity. This is an essential read, capturing both her genius and her legacy.””
— Chen Ly, New Scientist
“Dava Sobel offers a vivid narrative that uses Curie’s well-known story as scaffolding for tales of the brilliant young women who trained in her lab and became part of her scientific legacy….This superbly rendered portrait of Curie and her intellectual offspring could inspire many bright minds to follow in the scientist’s footsteps for generations to come. ”
— Science
“Sobel writes elegantly about science, unspooling Curie’s pursuits in the lab like a mystery.”
— The New York Times
“In her well-researched and compellingly written book, Sobel recounts how working with Curie raised the profile of many other pioneering women in radiochemistry and atomic physics. Sobel’s explanations of the science are crisp and accessible… There’s enough detail to permit chemists and physicists to peer over Curie’s shoulder in the lab. Sobel gives us a chance to share in the excitement and delight of the work that made Curie and her dozens of scientific offspring glow so brightly.””
— Michelle Francl, Nature
“Ms. Sobel’s book deftly explores the science of chemistry and the history of radium, while also following the remarkable thread of Marie Curie’s achievements—which came at a high personal cost. But what sets Ms. Sobel’s biography apart isn’t the timeline or the events of her subject’s life; it’s those women of science whose lives intersected with Curie’s, a cast of brilliant researchers and thinkers that the author skillfully weaves into her narrative. They are the “elements” of Marie Curie’s lab.... She drew them to her, and through her, they would draw others, lighting a path for women in science.”
— Brandy Schillace, The Wall Street Journal
“Preeminent science writer Sobel (The Glass Universe, 2016) brings forward a new array of female scientists in this vital portrait of Marie Curie and the women who joined her in her world-altering Paris laboratory…As Sobel vividly tells their tales of valor, diligence, and brilliance, she fuses elements human and scientific to create a dramatic group portrait encompassing passion, struggle, poignancy, and triumph.”
— Donna Seaman, Review of the Day, Booklist
“There is a very short list of biographers whose books you’ll read regardless of who the subject happens to be. And there is, perhaps, an even shorter list of brilliant science communicators who can make complex subjects both accessible and fascinating. At the center of that Venn diagram is Dava Sobel. The Elements of Marie Curie may be her best book yet.  I am absolutely scandalized by how little I actually knew about this extraordinary, accomplished, and inspiring woman. What a deeply satisfying read!”
— Susan Tunis, bookseller at Bookshop West Portal, San Francisco
“A ‘Top Ten’ Pick in Science”
— Publishers Weekly 2024 Fall Announcement Issue
“A lucid, literate biography, celebrating a scientific exemplar who, for all her fame, deserves to be better known.”
— Kirkus Reviews

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