Litsy

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

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Each chapter in this impressive, informative read follows a female scientist influenced by Marie Curie while also sharing her astounding story. Marie's love of science still influences young scientists today, and her dedication to learning is infectious.

This book is well written and the perfect mix of science and personal reflections.

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lil1inblue

Obsessive Genius: The Inner World of Marie Curie | Barbara Goldsmith

#dynamicds #discovery
@eggs @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks

Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks Perfect 👌🏻 2mo

lil1inblue @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks 💗 2mo

Eggs Sounds really good 👍🏼 2mo

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

pick

I love when the tone of science non-fiction surprises me. I think doing a tandem read with the print and audiobook helped in this case, because matching audio to speed of print reading gave the narrator a consistently clear, yet palpably upbeat tone, and it was wonderful to hear the audiobook narrator skillfully pronounce all the French words and names, along with a smattering of other European/Eastern European designations. 1/?

Robotswithpersonality 2/? There is a version of the history told here that is a great deal more fraught in the way it focuses on the many restrictions women faced, the loss of loved ones, the first world war, the growing understanding of the negative effects of exposure to radium and its emissions. Somehow Sobel's account gives these moments their proper weight without in any way sensationalizing or darkening the narrative. 4mo

Robotswithpersonality 3/? There is so much about Marie Curie's contributions and the web of interpersonal influence that furthered those contributions to science (and medicine) that I didn't know.
Sobel leaves space for an important function of history: not forgetting. Not forgetting how recently the overwhelming misogyny of the patriarchy had its grip somewhat loosened on so-called enlightened scientific institutions, and how that has affected the history of women 4mo

Robotswithpersonality 4/? in science. Of course, that makes every moment spent in this book discussing Marie and all the women she assisted/came into contact with during her work and all they're remembered for that much more triumphant.
What really struck me as a new piece of information in the picture of her position in history was how much she loved and missed her husband, those moments where in his honour, she deferred/transferred honours that would otherwise have 4mo

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Robotswithpersonality 5/? been laid at her feet. Between that and the amount of the book focused on her daughters, the family Curie and to a similar extent, Marie's siblings, are the backbone of the narrative.
I liked the mixing in, the introduction of different (male and female) scientists and their experiments, getting windows into the related science of the time. In that it was often discovering elements and the parts of an atom, it reminded me of 4mo

Robotswithpersonality 6/6 How to Make an Apple Pie From Scratch by Harry Cliff. If you want a work that is at least as much science history as it is biography, I highly recommend.
⚠️ miscarriage 4mo

Singout Thanks for the detailed description and insights. Looks fascinating! 4mo

TheBookHippie Looks amazing! 4mo

Robotswithpersonality @Singout @TheBookHippie Thanks! Hope you enjoy! ☺️ 4mo

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

Yikes!...Yeah. 🫤

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

“scintillate in green“ Sounds like fun, fancy weekend plans. 💚❇️✨☺️

Scintillate:
1)emit flashes of light; sparkle.
2) Physics
fluoresce momentarily when struck by a photon or charged particle

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

Beautiful response, awesome brother - and brother-in-law!

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

Degree is nice, job is better. 🫤🎓💵

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Robotswithpersonality

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

🧲♥️

9 likes

Larkken

Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science | Dava Sobel

so-so

I really wanted to like this, but it was like the author couldn‘t find enough information about the 35 (!!!) women that worked in the Curie lab to make their stories engaging, and so relied on MSC‘s life (which is perhaps better told elsewhere?) and on snippets of chemistry to fill in the gaps. Lack of focus, and the verbatim retellings of slanderous and misogynistic letters/newspaper articles/etc were a bit triggering, too, as a scientist.

Larkken But, look! I finally finished the book I was most looking forward to for #nonfictionnovember 😂 6mo

TheBookHippie I enjoyed her daughters book