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Marie Curie and Her Daughters: The Private Lives of Science's First Family
Published to widespread acclaim, in Marie Curie and Her Daughters, science writer Shelley Emling shows that far from a shy introvert toiling away in her laboratory, the famed scientist and two-time Nobel prize winner was nothing short of an iconoclast. Emling draws on personal letters released by Curie's only granddaughter to show how Marie influenced her daughters yet let them blaze their own Irene followed her mother's footsteps into science and was instrumental in the discovery of nuclear fission; Eve traveled the world as a foreign correspondent and then moved on to humanitarian missions. Emling also shows how Curie, following World War I, turned to America for help. Few people know about Curie's close friendship with American journalist Missy Meloney, who arranged speaking tours across the country for Marie, Eve, and Irene. Months on the road, charming audiences both large and small, endeared the Curies to American women and established a lifelong relationship with the United States that formed one of the strongest connections of Marie's life.Factually rich, personal, and original, this is an engrossing story about the most famous woman in science that rips the cover off the myth and reveals the real person, friend, and mother behind it.
249 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 21, 2012
About the author
Shelley Emling
5 books37 followersShelley Emling has been a journalist for 20 years. She was born in Missouri. Later she grew up in Dallas, Texas. She went to the University of Texas and started her journalism career at UPI.
Shelley is the author of two books: Your Guide to Retiring in Mexico, and most recently, The Fossil Hunter, published by Macmillan in 2009 about paleontologist Mary Anning, whom Shelley had learned of while on a holiday in England.[1] The Fossil Hunter was criticised by the New York Times for having moved away from the central narrative too often, but the reviewer nevertheless noted the ample footnotes, which put the subject's work "into the scientific and sociological context".[2] Nature, however, felt that Emling's "diligent" work was "more thorough and complete" than Tracy Chevalier's fictional account of Anning's life, Remarkable Creatures, which was released the same year – although the reviewer notes that the freedom of the fictionalised account proved to be more engaging.[3]
Shelley is the author of two books: Your Guide to Retiring in Mexico, and most recently, The Fossil Hunter, published by Macmillan in 2009 about paleontologist Mary Anning, whom Shelley had learned of while on a holiday in England.[1] The Fossil Hunter was criticised by the New York Times for having moved away from the central narrative too often, but the reviewer nevertheless noted the ample footnotes, which put the subject's work "into the scientific and sociological context".[2] Nature, however, felt that Emling's "diligent" work was "more thorough and complete" than Tracy Chevalier's fictional account of Anning's life, Remarkable Creatures, which was released the same year – although the reviewer notes that the freedom of the fictionalised account proved to be more engaging.[3]
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 132 reviews
June 9, 2015
Perhaps not a book that all would enjoy; but, one that spoke directly to my heart nonetheless. Best summarized inadvertently by Madame herself "Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained." --- Marie Curie
May 9, 2019
Excellent
An immensely readable biography of the Curie family. Had me engrossed from start to end. Talks not just about the people but also the history of world science in the first half of the 20th century. Most recommended.
An immensely readable biography of the Curie family. Had me engrossed from start to end. Talks not just about the people but also the history of world science in the first half of the 20th century. Most recommended.
September 9, 2012
I try to read a couple of non-fiction books every month, I enjoy biographies and travel books. I was delighted to receive a copy of Marie Curie and her Daughters by Shelley Emling through my letter-box a few weeks ago. The book will be published by Palgrave Macmillan on 20 September 2012.
Science has never really been my 'thing'. At school I really struggled with physics and chemistry and was much happier in English Language or History classes. My mind is not structured enough to understand how science works, I'm a bit of a day-dreamer and prefer using my imagination rather than learning facts, figures and formula. Of course I knew who Marie Curie was, her great achievements, her contribution to science, to medical advances and impact on the world, but other than that, I really had very little idea about her life.
Shelley Emling has based this book on Marie Curie's relationship with her two daughers; Irene and Eve. The book begins after the early death of Pierre Curie, when Marie is left to carry on the work that they started as a couple and to bring up her two small daughters alone. Emling has concentrated her book on the correspondence between Marie and her daughters. She was not an overly-protective mother, nor did she hesitate to spend time away from her daughters, yet this did not weaken their relationship. Marie was a caring and loving mother, who encouraged her daughters to become individuals, to achieve what the wanted to and to become famous and influential women in their own rights.
Marie Curie found an advocate in Missy Meloney, an American journalist who campaigned in the USA on behalf on Marie. Missy was able to rally support from wealthy and important US women, who in turn raised money so that Marie could continue with her important and ground-breaking research. It says a lot about Marie Curie and her husband that although they discovered radium and it's remarkable properties, they made the decision not to profit from it. It was their belief that their discovery should be used for the greater masses and for the advancement of medical treatment. It was because of these decisions that Marie had to depend on donations to carry out her work, and that she had to carry out tours of the States to make herself known.
Shelley Emling has written a book that is very readable, concentrating more on Marie Curie's private life and her relationship with her family than on the scientific details that could have bogged down the story for me.
Marie Curie is portrayed as a woman of integrity, strong beliefs and views, yet she is not painted as a saint-like figure in any way. She had her foibles that only add to her humanity.
I was very impressed by Emling's writing style - she has told the story of three extraordinary women who were way ahead of their time in an interesting and very readable manner.
Science has never really been my 'thing'. At school I really struggled with physics and chemistry and was much happier in English Language or History classes. My mind is not structured enough to understand how science works, I'm a bit of a day-dreamer and prefer using my imagination rather than learning facts, figures and formula. Of course I knew who Marie Curie was, her great achievements, her contribution to science, to medical advances and impact on the world, but other than that, I really had very little idea about her life.
Shelley Emling has based this book on Marie Curie's relationship with her two daughers; Irene and Eve. The book begins after the early death of Pierre Curie, when Marie is left to carry on the work that they started as a couple and to bring up her two small daughters alone. Emling has concentrated her book on the correspondence between Marie and her daughters. She was not an overly-protective mother, nor did she hesitate to spend time away from her daughters, yet this did not weaken their relationship. Marie was a caring and loving mother, who encouraged her daughters to become individuals, to achieve what the wanted to and to become famous and influential women in their own rights.
Marie Curie found an advocate in Missy Meloney, an American journalist who campaigned in the USA on behalf on Marie. Missy was able to rally support from wealthy and important US women, who in turn raised money so that Marie could continue with her important and ground-breaking research. It says a lot about Marie Curie and her husband that although they discovered radium and it's remarkable properties, they made the decision not to profit from it. It was their belief that their discovery should be used for the greater masses and for the advancement of medical treatment. It was because of these decisions that Marie had to depend on donations to carry out her work, and that she had to carry out tours of the States to make herself known.
Shelley Emling has written a book that is very readable, concentrating more on Marie Curie's private life and her relationship with her family than on the scientific details that could have bogged down the story for me.
Marie Curie is portrayed as a woman of integrity, strong beliefs and views, yet she is not painted as a saint-like figure in any way. She had her foibles that only add to her humanity.
I was very impressed by Emling's writing style - she has told the story of three extraordinary women who were way ahead of their time in an interesting and very readable manner.
August 2, 2013
It is hard to believe that any one could take the life stories of one of the most famous female scientists in the world and her two daughters, who were accomplished in their own right, and make it barely readable. Yet that's exactly what happened here. The author's first wrong turn was to start the narrative sometime after Pierre, Marie's husband, had died in an accident. I get it, the book is called,Marie and Her Daughters, not Marie and Pierre and Their Daughters. But by starting the story at that point, it seems a lot of it goes untold. What was the Curies' marriage like? Were Marie's pregnancies easy? How were the girls as babies? How did the loss of Pierre affect his daughters? How did Marie handle becoming a widow at a young age? These are not questions Emler is interested by, unfortunately. Then there's the matter of her pedestrian prose. It was a struggle to finish this book. I learned some interesting facts about Marie Curie and her daughters - I just wish the journey had been a lot more enjoyable.
October 18, 2020
Shed a tear when I hit the last page of the book! Over these few days of regular reading I grew close to the story narrating the Curie women's life stories, their dedication to science, their countless efforts in making the world a better place and most of all, in sustaining curiosity to the unknown, quiet often at their personal health cost. Thank you for such a moving inspiring account of the Curie women's and their families' life stories.
July 10, 2022
Marie Curie was, and still remains, one of the most admired women in history. Along with her husband Pierre, she discovered radium and its properties that would have untold beneficence to science and medicine. Although she was constantly denied membership in numerous scientific societies, always due to her gender, she nonetheless was the recipient of two Nobel prizes. Marie was also the mother of two girls, Irene and Eve, who Marie adored. Even though she was forced to spend so much time away from her daughters because of her research, she kept in constant letter contact with them, always adding a difficult math problem for them to solve. Irene would follow in her parents' footsteps, dedicating her life to science and winning a Nobel prize of her own. Her marriage to the handsome, charismatic Frederic was a near mirror image of her own parents as both Irene and Frederic continued the study of radioactivity. He would eventually win a Nobel prize as well. Eve, however, was not the least bit interested in a scientific life. She loved music and the arts and became her mother's biographer, an admired journalist, and a staunch supporter of charitable causes for the poor, especially children.
I enjoyed this book about the remarkable Curie women and the astonishing legacy they left the world. At times the science became a bit mind-boggling for me but on the whole it was quite well done.
I enjoyed this book about the remarkable Curie women and the astonishing legacy they left the world. At times the science became a bit mind-boggling for me but on the whole it was quite well done.
December 18, 2020
3.5 stars. I enjoyed reading this book which zooms into Marie Curie's life after the death of her husband Pierre and the lives of her two daughters, Irene and Eve. Before reading this book, I was completely unaware that her daughters had also had such illustrious lives and found it fascinating to read about the family's lives through WWI and II. I would say though that this is not the book to pick up if you have never read anything about Marie Curie and would like a general introduction to her life and scientific work as this book does not examine her whole life. But as an accompaniment to a general biography, I think this is a really interesting read precisely because it looks more broadly at the Curie family and not just Marie. The tone of the book is a bit dry on occasion and there are some needless repetitions which could have easily been edited out. But overall I found it very easy to read and I remained engaged with the Curie's life stories throughout.
December 3, 2021
I am so surprised by how much I didn't know about the Curie family and their successes. This book was not only interesting but really inspiring in that every woman in the biography is presented in a light that highlights their hard work and constant dedication to science and human well-being. Not for fame or fortune, but for the sake of furthering human knowledge and the love of science and research. I read this at a time where I am struggling to find my purpose as I come close to completing my master's degree. As I continuously apply for jobs or fellowships or try to decide what's next, I keep Marie's dedication and Irene and Eve's passion in mind. For the love of learning, discovery, and each other, may we continue to build our future.
July 25, 2021
Difficult read but very informative; learned a lot about radioactivity as well as the history of the science of radioactivity. Also about the Curie family -- Marie as well as her descendants very accomplished, down to earth and politically progressive. Not only did most of the family end up with Nobel prizes, most were politically active during and between the world wars -- understood the importance of studying radioactivity and using if for the benefit of humankind, not as a weapon of war.
March 15, 2024
Marie Curie and Her Daughters is author Shelley Emling’s fascinating biography of the renowned Polish-French scientist Marie Curie and her two daughters, Irène and Ève, who, though not as famous as their mother, led very interesting lives and deserve to be remembered. Emling begins her book in 1906, with the death of Marie’s husband Pierre, with whom she shared the 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics, in an accident in Paris, when he was run over by a horse-drawn carriage. She assumes knowledge, on the reader’s part, of the facts of Marie’s early life: how she came from Warsaw to Paris as a young woman to study at the Sorbonne, where she met Pierre, and their discovery of radium, which changed the world. For readers who are unfamiliar with those facts, there are many other biographies of Marie Curie which cover them in detail.
Pierre’s death left Marie to bring up her two daughters alone. Irène was eight at the time and had fond memories of her father, and always honored his memory later in life, but Ève was just over a year old and had no memory of her father. Marie obtained her husband’s professorship at the Sorbonne, becoming the first female professor there, and she insisted that she earn it in her own right, rather than being given the professorship out of charity. However, she was denied membership in the French Academy of Sciences, simply because she was a woman. Much later, her daughter Irène also tried and failed to obtain membership in the Academy. It was not until 1962 that a woman, one of Marie’s students, became a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Marie was devoted to her research and was often separated from her daughters. They frequently wrote letters to each other, and these letters are a major source for Emling’s book. The author had conversations with Irène’s daughter Hélène (also a scientist), who shared previously unpublished letters with her. From an early age, Irène showed a strong interest in science, and her mother encouraged it, sending math problems to her in her letters. Ève’s interests lay elsewhere, particularly in the arts. At first Marie showed a certain amount of disappointment that Ève didn’t share her passion for science, but Ève always said that her mother never tried to force her or her sister into science. It just happened to be that that was where Irène’s interests lay.
In 1911, Marie had a love affair with physicist Paul Langevin, who was formerly an assistant to Pierre. Langevin was married, and several years younger than Marie. When his wife found their love letters and gave them to the newspapers, it caused a scandal, which almost cost Marie the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her discovery of radium. People threw rocks at her house and told her to go back to Poland. (Marie frequently faced discrimination in France for being foreign-born, as well as a woman). In spite of the scandal, she received the prize, becoming not only the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, but also the first person to win two, in two different fields. The Nobel Committee discouraged her from traveling to Sweden to accept the prize, but she went nevertheless, and gave her acceptance speech to great acclaim.
During World War I, Marie brought mobile radiography units (vehicles with X-ray machines) to the front lines, which saved the lives of many soldiers, since it became much quicker to diagnose their wounds, and it also meant fewer men had to have limbs amputated. Irène, who had taken a nursing course, went with her. She trained other women as her assistants, and it is estimated that the mobile radiography units treated over a million soldiers.
One of the most fascinating parts of Emling’s book is her account of Marie’s visits to the United States, and her friendship with the American journalist Missy Meloney. Marie, who hated publicity, usually refused to give interviews to the press, but Meloney, who became the editor of the predecessor of New York Magazine, managed to obtain one with her, and the two women became friends. Meloney’s views on the role of women were different from Marie’s. She said she didn’t believe in women having a career outside the home, although her own life was a contradiction of that belief, as was, of course, Marie’s. Meloney held conservative political views, even though, later in life, she became a friend of Eleanor Roosevelt, and she supported women’s right to the vote. Marie was largely non-political, believing that scientific research should have nothing to do with politics, even though she did express an opinion, privately, that women should have the vote (which they did not get, in France, until 1944), and, toward the end of her life, she expressed hatred for fascist dictators.
After World War I, Marie had very little money for her Radium Institute in Paris. France, in general, was in terrible economic shape following the war, and there was no money to be spent on scientific research. Marie decided to turn to the United States for the funding she needed. She also had very little radium left. At the time, the United States was the largest producer of radium. No one knew yet, about how destructive radium could be to people’s health. Marie was often ill herself, but did not make the connection until it was too late. Of course, she focused on radium’s benefits in treating cancer. In the 1920s, there was a craze for radium in the United States, and it was used in many commercial products, including makeup, toothpaste, and watch faces. Dancers on Broadway wore costumes covered with radium so they would glow in the dark.
In 1921, Meloney was instrumental in organizing Marie’s first visit to the United States. She accompanied her on the voyage, on the sister ship of the Titanic, and Marie’s daughters, twenty-three-year-old Irène and sixteen-year-old Ève, went with them. Marie was a celebrity in the United States, much more so than in France, and as soon as the word came out that she was coming, many organizations associated with the women’s suffrage movement gave her money for her Radium Institute, and raised the funds for her supply of radium. But Marie hated all the receptions and social events she was forced to attend. They exhausted her, and her already poor health took a turn for the worse. Her daughters often had to stand in for her. Irène, who shared her mother’s retiring nature, didn’t particularly enjoy the social events but attended out of duty. Ève, who was much more sociable than her mother and sister, truly enjoyed the events and became very popular. She loved the United States, and, as we will see, eventually became a citizen.
Marie was awarded many honorary doctorates in the United States, even though Harvard refused her one because she was a woman. It wasn’t until many years later that Harvard finally gave an honorary doctorate to a woman. One of the highlights of Marie’s visit was her tour of the women’s colleges, including Smith and Vassar. She was very happy to see the number of women in the United States who chose a career in the sciences—many more than in France. Marie’s stay in the United States culminated in a visit to the White House, where she was presented with the supply of radium for her institute.
Once she returned to France, Marie’s institute became one of the major research laboratories in Europe. She insisted on hiring as many women as possible, and especially tried to recruit Polish women. Later in the 1920s, she expressed a wish to establish a second Radium Institute in Warsaw, the city of her birth, but, once again, she didn’t have enough money, or enough radium, and she decided to make a second visit to the United States. But this was 1929, when the United States was on the verge of the Great Depression, and it was much more difficult to obtain money for scientific research, especially in a country as far away as Poland. But Meloney came to the rescue, and arranged for Marie’s second visit to the United States, as well as the funds for a second supply of radium, for the institute in Warsaw. This visit lacked the social whirl of the first one, even though certain events could not be avoided, and this time Marie’s daughters did not accompany her. Irène was married, and Ève was unable to go. The Radium Institute in Warsaw opened in 1932 and became a major center for the treatment of cancer, but, sadly, Marie didn’t live much longer after this. She died in 1934, of an illness that we know now to have been caused by radiation poisoning. Ève, who had become much closer to her mother in the last years of her life, was by her side.
Besides telling the compelling story of Marie Curie’s life, Emling writes about the lives of her daughters. Irène worked closely with her mother in her laboratory, and a major interest of hers was the element polonium, which Marie had discovered along with radium and named after the country of her birth. In 1926, Irène married the physicist Frédéric Joliot, a student of Paul Langevin. At first, Marie opposed the marriage because she was concerned that Frédéric was quite a bit younger than Irène and had a very different personality from hers, being gregarious, flirtatious, and something of a ladies’ man. But it turned out that their personalities complemented each other instead of clashing, and their marriage was very successful. As Emling points out, they were very similar to Marie and Pierre. In both couples, the husband was more outgoing than the wife, and the husband’s major interest was physics, while the wife’s was chemistry. Irène and Frédéric came very close to discovering the neutron and the positron, but they didn’t realize at first what they had found, and their discoveries were credited to other scientists.
Eventually, though, Irène and Frédéric had a breakthrough, discovering artificial radioactivity, and the process of transforming elements that are not naturally radioactive into elements that are. And so Irène achieved the alchemists’ dream of transforming one element into another. She and Frédéric were awarded the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery. Eventually, their research led to the discovery of nuclear fission and the development of the atomic bomb, although they were strongly opposed to the idea of their research being used to create weapons of mass destruction. They always meant for their discoveries to be used for peaceful purposes: energy and medical research.
Unlike her largely non-political mother, Irène became a political activist after the rise of fascism. She and Frédéric joined the Socialist Party in France because of its stand against fascism. They worked for the French Resistance during World War II, even though Irène frequently went to Switzerland because of ill health. She had contracted tuberculosis during World War I. After the end of World War II, Frédéric joined the Communist Party and expressed an increasing admiration for the Soviet Union, largely because of their support for scientists. Irène did not join the Communist Party, but her ties to Communism got her into trouble when she visited the United States after World War II. She was detained on Ellis Island, and Einstein, who was a close friend of the Curie family, helped to obtain her release. Irène eventually became the director of her mother’s Radium Institute, and she stayed involved in politics, holding a government post under a Socialist prime minister. She was instrumental in finally getting the vote for women in France in 1944. Sadly, her health, always fragile, deteriorated in the 1940s and 1950s. A friend in the United States sent her an antibiotic, which cured her tuberculosis, but she contracted leukemia as a result of her work with radioactive elements, and she died in 1956. Her husband outlived her by only two years. Their two children, Hélène and Pierre, also became scientists. Hélène married Paul Langevin’s grandson.
As mentioned earlier, Ève Curie’s interests were in the arts, not science. At first she wanted to be a concert pianist, and had a somewhat successful career, but she started too late to become a famous pianist. Then she became a writer and journalist. Her first major success was a biography of her mother, Madame Curie, which became the basis for a Hollywood film starring Greer Garson. During her research for the biography, Ève realized how little she knew about her mother’s life, especially her early life in Poland, but relatives in Poland helped her out. During Ève’s childhood, she and her mother had not been close, because they spent so much time away from each other and their interests were different. But Ève cared for Marie in her last years and, when she was researching the biography, she got to know her mother better than she ever did in life.
Ève left France during the German occupation in World War II and came to England, where she met Winston Churchill. She joined the Free French forces and became a war correspondent and traveled to many different fronts, including North Africa, India, and China. In India, she met Gandhi and expressed admiration for his doctrine of peaceful resistance, but she thought it wouldn’t work against the Nazis. She published a volume of her wartime journalism, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, but lost out.
After the war, Ève worked for NATO and married the American diplomat Henry Labouisse. They did not have children together, even though Labouisse had children from his first marriage. Ève eventually became a United States citizen. Her husband was one of the founders of UNICEF and won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1965. And so, as Ève herself commented, she was the only member of her family not to win a Nobel Prize. She and her husband traveled to more than 100 countries, giving aid to children. She died in 2007, at the age of 102.
I highly recommend Emling’s biography. She tells the lives of these extraordinary women in a way that makes the reader relate to them, and she explains the science very well, without going over the head of a reader who doesn’t have a background in science. Readers who want a biography of Marie Curie that covers her early life should look elsewhere, but this book tells the story of an aspect of her life that isn’t covered in some of the major biographies: her life after World War I, her visits to the United States, and her relationship with her daughters, as well as the stories of their lives. Emling shows the reader how Marie and Irène were discriminated against, as women in science, and how much they achieved in spite of that, and how Ève made great achievements in a very different career. This is a perfect read for Women’s History Month.
Pierre’s death left Marie to bring up her two daughters alone. Irène was eight at the time and had fond memories of her father, and always honored his memory later in life, but Ève was just over a year old and had no memory of her father. Marie obtained her husband’s professorship at the Sorbonne, becoming the first female professor there, and she insisted that she earn it in her own right, rather than being given the professorship out of charity. However, she was denied membership in the French Academy of Sciences, simply because she was a woman. Much later, her daughter Irène also tried and failed to obtain membership in the Academy. It was not until 1962 that a woman, one of Marie’s students, became a member of the French Academy of Sciences.
Marie was devoted to her research and was often separated from her daughters. They frequently wrote letters to each other, and these letters are a major source for Emling’s book. The author had conversations with Irène’s daughter Hélène (also a scientist), who shared previously unpublished letters with her. From an early age, Irène showed a strong interest in science, and her mother encouraged it, sending math problems to her in her letters. Ève’s interests lay elsewhere, particularly in the arts. At first Marie showed a certain amount of disappointment that Ève didn’t share her passion for science, but Ève always said that her mother never tried to force her or her sister into science. It just happened to be that that was where Irène’s interests lay.
In 1911, Marie had a love affair with physicist Paul Langevin, who was formerly an assistant to Pierre. Langevin was married, and several years younger than Marie. When his wife found their love letters and gave them to the newspapers, it caused a scandal, which almost cost Marie the 1911 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her discovery of radium. People threw rocks at her house and told her to go back to Poland. (Marie frequently faced discrimination in France for being foreign-born, as well as a woman). In spite of the scandal, she received the prize, becoming not only the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, but also the first person to win two, in two different fields. The Nobel Committee discouraged her from traveling to Sweden to accept the prize, but she went nevertheless, and gave her acceptance speech to great acclaim.
During World War I, Marie brought mobile radiography units (vehicles with X-ray machines) to the front lines, which saved the lives of many soldiers, since it became much quicker to diagnose their wounds, and it also meant fewer men had to have limbs amputated. Irène, who had taken a nursing course, went with her. She trained other women as her assistants, and it is estimated that the mobile radiography units treated over a million soldiers.
One of the most fascinating parts of Emling’s book is her account of Marie’s visits to the United States, and her friendship with the American journalist Missy Meloney. Marie, who hated publicity, usually refused to give interviews to the press, but Meloney, who became the editor of the predecessor of New York Magazine, managed to obtain one with her, and the two women became friends. Meloney’s views on the role of women were different from Marie’s. She said she didn’t believe in women having a career outside the home, although her own life was a contradiction of that belief, as was, of course, Marie’s. Meloney held conservative political views, even though, later in life, she became a friend of Eleanor Roosevelt, and she supported women’s right to the vote. Marie was largely non-political, believing that scientific research should have nothing to do with politics, even though she did express an opinion, privately, that women should have the vote (which they did not get, in France, until 1944), and, toward the end of her life, she expressed hatred for fascist dictators.
After World War I, Marie had very little money for her Radium Institute in Paris. France, in general, was in terrible economic shape following the war, and there was no money to be spent on scientific research. Marie decided to turn to the United States for the funding she needed. She also had very little radium left. At the time, the United States was the largest producer of radium. No one knew yet, about how destructive radium could be to people’s health. Marie was often ill herself, but did not make the connection until it was too late. Of course, she focused on radium’s benefits in treating cancer. In the 1920s, there was a craze for radium in the United States, and it was used in many commercial products, including makeup, toothpaste, and watch faces. Dancers on Broadway wore costumes covered with radium so they would glow in the dark.
In 1921, Meloney was instrumental in organizing Marie’s first visit to the United States. She accompanied her on the voyage, on the sister ship of the Titanic, and Marie’s daughters, twenty-three-year-old Irène and sixteen-year-old Ève, went with them. Marie was a celebrity in the United States, much more so than in France, and as soon as the word came out that she was coming, many organizations associated with the women’s suffrage movement gave her money for her Radium Institute, and raised the funds for her supply of radium. But Marie hated all the receptions and social events she was forced to attend. They exhausted her, and her already poor health took a turn for the worse. Her daughters often had to stand in for her. Irène, who shared her mother’s retiring nature, didn’t particularly enjoy the social events but attended out of duty. Ève, who was much more sociable than her mother and sister, truly enjoyed the events and became very popular. She loved the United States, and, as we will see, eventually became a citizen.
Marie was awarded many honorary doctorates in the United States, even though Harvard refused her one because she was a woman. It wasn’t until many years later that Harvard finally gave an honorary doctorate to a woman. One of the highlights of Marie’s visit was her tour of the women’s colleges, including Smith and Vassar. She was very happy to see the number of women in the United States who chose a career in the sciences—many more than in France. Marie’s stay in the United States culminated in a visit to the White House, where she was presented with the supply of radium for her institute.
Once she returned to France, Marie’s institute became one of the major research laboratories in Europe. She insisted on hiring as many women as possible, and especially tried to recruit Polish women. Later in the 1920s, she expressed a wish to establish a second Radium Institute in Warsaw, the city of her birth, but, once again, she didn’t have enough money, or enough radium, and she decided to make a second visit to the United States. But this was 1929, when the United States was on the verge of the Great Depression, and it was much more difficult to obtain money for scientific research, especially in a country as far away as Poland. But Meloney came to the rescue, and arranged for Marie’s second visit to the United States, as well as the funds for a second supply of radium, for the institute in Warsaw. This visit lacked the social whirl of the first one, even though certain events could not be avoided, and this time Marie’s daughters did not accompany her. Irène was married, and Ève was unable to go. The Radium Institute in Warsaw opened in 1932 and became a major center for the treatment of cancer, but, sadly, Marie didn’t live much longer after this. She died in 1934, of an illness that we know now to have been caused by radiation poisoning. Ève, who had become much closer to her mother in the last years of her life, was by her side.
Besides telling the compelling story of Marie Curie’s life, Emling writes about the lives of her daughters. Irène worked closely with her mother in her laboratory, and a major interest of hers was the element polonium, which Marie had discovered along with radium and named after the country of her birth. In 1926, Irène married the physicist Frédéric Joliot, a student of Paul Langevin. At first, Marie opposed the marriage because she was concerned that Frédéric was quite a bit younger than Irène and had a very different personality from hers, being gregarious, flirtatious, and something of a ladies’ man. But it turned out that their personalities complemented each other instead of clashing, and their marriage was very successful. As Emling points out, they were very similar to Marie and Pierre. In both couples, the husband was more outgoing than the wife, and the husband’s major interest was physics, while the wife’s was chemistry. Irène and Frédéric came very close to discovering the neutron and the positron, but they didn’t realize at first what they had found, and their discoveries were credited to other scientists.
Eventually, though, Irène and Frédéric had a breakthrough, discovering artificial radioactivity, and the process of transforming elements that are not naturally radioactive into elements that are. And so Irène achieved the alchemists’ dream of transforming one element into another. She and Frédéric were awarded the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their discovery. Eventually, their research led to the discovery of nuclear fission and the development of the atomic bomb, although they were strongly opposed to the idea of their research being used to create weapons of mass destruction. They always meant for their discoveries to be used for peaceful purposes: energy and medical research.
Unlike her largely non-political mother, Irène became a political activist after the rise of fascism. She and Frédéric joined the Socialist Party in France because of its stand against fascism. They worked for the French Resistance during World War II, even though Irène frequently went to Switzerland because of ill health. She had contracted tuberculosis during World War I. After the end of World War II, Frédéric joined the Communist Party and expressed an increasing admiration for the Soviet Union, largely because of their support for scientists. Irène did not join the Communist Party, but her ties to Communism got her into trouble when she visited the United States after World War II. She was detained on Ellis Island, and Einstein, who was a close friend of the Curie family, helped to obtain her release. Irène eventually became the director of her mother’s Radium Institute, and she stayed involved in politics, holding a government post under a Socialist prime minister. She was instrumental in finally getting the vote for women in France in 1944. Sadly, her health, always fragile, deteriorated in the 1940s and 1950s. A friend in the United States sent her an antibiotic, which cured her tuberculosis, but she contracted leukemia as a result of her work with radioactive elements, and she died in 1956. Her husband outlived her by only two years. Their two children, Hélène and Pierre, also became scientists. Hélène married Paul Langevin’s grandson.
As mentioned earlier, Ève Curie’s interests were in the arts, not science. At first she wanted to be a concert pianist, and had a somewhat successful career, but she started too late to become a famous pianist. Then she became a writer and journalist. Her first major success was a biography of her mother, Madame Curie, which became the basis for a Hollywood film starring Greer Garson. During her research for the biography, Ève realized how little she knew about her mother’s life, especially her early life in Poland, but relatives in Poland helped her out. During Ève’s childhood, she and her mother had not been close, because they spent so much time away from each other and their interests were different. But Ève cared for Marie in her last years and, when she was researching the biography, she got to know her mother better than she ever did in life.
Ève left France during the German occupation in World War II and came to England, where she met Winston Churchill. She joined the Free French forces and became a war correspondent and traveled to many different fronts, including North Africa, India, and China. In India, she met Gandhi and expressed admiration for his doctrine of peaceful resistance, but she thought it wouldn’t work against the Nazis. She published a volume of her wartime journalism, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, but lost out.
After the war, Ève worked for NATO and married the American diplomat Henry Labouisse. They did not have children together, even though Labouisse had children from his first marriage. Ève eventually became a United States citizen. Her husband was one of the founders of UNICEF and won a Nobel Peace Prize in 1965. And so, as Ève herself commented, she was the only member of her family not to win a Nobel Prize. She and her husband traveled to more than 100 countries, giving aid to children. She died in 2007, at the age of 102.
I highly recommend Emling’s biography. She tells the lives of these extraordinary women in a way that makes the reader relate to them, and she explains the science very well, without going over the head of a reader who doesn’t have a background in science. Readers who want a biography of Marie Curie that covers her early life should look elsewhere, but this book tells the story of an aspect of her life that isn’t covered in some of the major biographies: her life after World War I, her visits to the United States, and her relationship with her daughters, as well as the stories of their lives. Emling shows the reader how Marie and Irène were discriminated against, as women in science, and how much they achieved in spite of that, and how Ève made great achievements in a very different career. This is a perfect read for Women’s History Month.
January 9, 2021
Extremely interesting book about Marie Curie and her daughters Irene and Eve. I learned so much about Marie Curie’s scientific work but it was her work as a humanitarian that was both surprising and intriguing. For example, I had no idea that Marie made X-ray machines and along with Irene save countless soldiers’ lives during WWI. Irene eventually becomes a scientist and earns her own Nobel Prize. Eve is more artistic by nature turning her efforts to writing. She becomes a war correspondent during WWII. What an incredible family of three brave and inspirational women!
August 24, 2012
Before reading this book, I had very limited knowledge about Marie Curie. I knew that she and her husband were both scientists. I knew she was a woman pioneer with it came to science. I knew she did a lot of important work with radium. I knew that a lot of her research was the basis for a lot of the radiation treatments that are still used today to treat things like cancer. That's about all I knew so it was really interesting to read this book in order to get a better idea of the impact that Marie Curie had as well as who she was as a person.
This book draws a lot on correspondence between Marie Curie and her daughters, one of which became a famous scientist in her own right, which is pretty cool. Although the title is "Marie Curie and Her Daughters," the book really focuses on Marie Curie, mostly in her latter years after she had already become famous for her work, which was just fine with me. Curie was truly fascinating and this book definitely exemplifies this. She fully dedicated herself to science in a world that wasn't really open to her. Women scientists were few and far between back in the day.
One thing that really intrigued me about the book is how ahead of her time Curie was. There are a couple of pictures of Curie in the book at different conferences and meeting other important people and they are all with men. She really was one of the only women in her field, which is really crazy to think about. She definitely paved the way for a lot of women that came after her.
Also, I thought it was sort of interesting how the public, especially the French public in the book seemed to like and dislike her at different times throughout her life. Now France seems all about claiming her as one of their own, even though she was born in Poland. This really illustrates how things can change relatively quickly with time.
This book didn't necessarily satisfy everything that I wanted to know about Marie Curie. It's fairly short and as I said earlier, it only covers the latter half of her life. However, the book definitely whet my appetite to go out and read more about her!
This book draws a lot on correspondence between Marie Curie and her daughters, one of which became a famous scientist in her own right, which is pretty cool. Although the title is "Marie Curie and Her Daughters," the book really focuses on Marie Curie, mostly in her latter years after she had already become famous for her work, which was just fine with me. Curie was truly fascinating and this book definitely exemplifies this. She fully dedicated herself to science in a world that wasn't really open to her. Women scientists were few and far between back in the day.
One thing that really intrigued me about the book is how ahead of her time Curie was. There are a couple of pictures of Curie in the book at different conferences and meeting other important people and they are all with men. She really was one of the only women in her field, which is really crazy to think about. She definitely paved the way for a lot of women that came after her.
Also, I thought it was sort of interesting how the public, especially the French public in the book seemed to like and dislike her at different times throughout her life. Now France seems all about claiming her as one of their own, even though she was born in Poland. This really illustrates how things can change relatively quickly with time.
This book didn't necessarily satisfy everything that I wanted to know about Marie Curie. It's fairly short and as I said earlier, it only covers the latter half of her life. However, the book definitely whet my appetite to go out and read more about her!
March 9, 2013
I wish I could give this a higher rating. When I was in high school I read with great interest the book by Evgrandaughtere Curie which was the Biography of her mother Madame Curie. I was so impressed with her drive and her interest in excelling and finding great scientific discoveries (65) This book revealed the hidden side of the Marie Curie, and her affair with a younger married man whidh dres the enmity of the French establishment and caused great international disfavor. It was only America who treated this shy woneb who was instrumental in the discovery of radiation and nuclear fission. Marie Curie was deteremined to live life the way she wanted to and she passed that trait on to her two girls. Irene followed her mother into the scientific field and also won award. Eve, set off in a different direction as a foreign correspondent and moved on to humanitarian mizzionz. I felt rather cheated in this book because instead of bringing me up to speed with a short recap of the birth of the girls, and the Marie and Pierre story, it plunged right into the international war time bickering and anger and changed my whole opinion of Marie Curie. She certainly was a driven women and so were her daughters. This book was written by Shelley E$mling using the private letters, and unpublished papers and an interview with her granddaughter Helene Langevin-Joliot. The world will forever be changed by these scientific discoveries and the drive behind the women. Interesting and probably as true as letters can make it but I wanted to know the facts before all the the details of the lifestyle, to me that would have made it a good book.
November 19, 2013
There was much disagreement in my book club over whether or not this was a good book. I very much enjoyed it and did not feel it was poorly written. Some book club members noted some factual discrepencies that I am not sure about. Even if there are mistakes, though, I very much enjoyed seeing the human side of Marie Curie. We so often think of her as solely a super-scientist (which she was), and don't know anything about the rest of her life.
I was fascinated with both her parenting (sending difficult math problems through the mail during her frequent separations from her daughters) and learning more about radiation and radioactivity. I vaguely knew that both she and one of her daughters won Nobel Prizes, but did not understand how amazing her family and close colleagues were. I was also interested in the long view of scientific research at the time and the assertion towards the end of the book that scientists have to provide results quickly nowadays, and research like the Curies would be unlikely to happen today. Something to think about.
I would have liked to learn more about Eve Curie, who seems almost like an afterthought in this book. There aren't even any photos of her as an adult despite her high profile career. She sounds like a very interesting woman who was close to her family despite being the non-scientist "black sheep."
This book got me, a non-scientist, more interested in the Curies. I am also eager to seek out Eve Curie's books, which I understand are difficult to find.
I was fascinated with both her parenting (sending difficult math problems through the mail during her frequent separations from her daughters) and learning more about radiation and radioactivity. I vaguely knew that both she and one of her daughters won Nobel Prizes, but did not understand how amazing her family and close colleagues were. I was also interested in the long view of scientific research at the time and the assertion towards the end of the book that scientists have to provide results quickly nowadays, and research like the Curies would be unlikely to happen today. Something to think about.
I would have liked to learn more about Eve Curie, who seems almost like an afterthought in this book. There aren't even any photos of her as an adult despite her high profile career. She sounds like a very interesting woman who was close to her family despite being the non-scientist "black sheep."
This book got me, a non-scientist, more interested in the Curies. I am also eager to seek out Eve Curie's books, which I understand are difficult to find.
October 27, 2012
I call this a "supplemental" biography that continues the story of Marie's life with her daughters' and grandchildren's lives and tremendous contributions in science and humanitarian efforts. Marie Curie has been one of my heroes since reading daughter Eve's biography of her mother 50 years ago. This book picks up after Marie's famous discoveries, and delves into her affair with her deceased husband's brilliant student Paul Langevin, her heroic work providing x-rays during World War I, her tour of the United States to raise money to continue her work and her continued research and mentoring in spite of serious health problems. It lives up to its title by revealing the relationship with her daughters, the like-talented Irene and the artistic Eve. I am impressed all the more by not just one, but seven members of this incredible family, and now count all of them as heroes. My only complaint is that no picture of Eve was included in the illustrations.
November 24, 2012
Not a beautifully written book, but an interesting and important one as it contains letters between Curie and her daughters that have never been used in the many biographies of Curie and were translated into English for the purpose of using in this book. Emling also interviews Curie's granddaughter for this book as well. The book focuses on the story of Curie after winning her two Nobel prizes when she is trying to establish her Radium Institute and replenish her supply of uranium, both very costly. In meeting the American journalist Missy Meloney, Curie found an advocate for her cause. Meloney brought Curie to America on a fundraising tour (and also to "use" her, in a sense, to promote women's suffrage in the U.S.). As the Curies had sworn to never patent their process, they never made any money from their discoveries, believing that science belonged to the public. Meloney thought it was odd at the time; it is hard to imagine anyone doing that today.
March 6, 2013
I've read several biographies of Marie Curie over the past 50 plus years. Generally they tell of her hard work leading up to winning the Noble Prize in Physics in 1903 and the Noble Prize in Chemistry in 1911. Her life after that time is then summed up in a final chapter without much detail. This book is primarily focused on the last 25 years of her life (she died in 1934) and the lives of her daughters.
Ms. Emling tells a number of interesting stories about the 3 women, but there is no big story arc. All members of the Curie family seem to have been very bright and had a lot of success in life. The ones who worked with radioactive materials had many health problems and died in their 50's and 60's. Marie's daughter Eve, whose interest and skills were in music and writing, lived to be 102. A lesson there?
Ms. Emling tells a number of interesting stories about the 3 women, but there is no big story arc. All members of the Curie family seem to have been very bright and had a lot of success in life. The ones who worked with radioactive materials had many health problems and died in their 50's and 60's. Marie's daughter Eve, whose interest and skills were in music and writing, lived to be 102. A lesson there?
December 31, 2014
I really enjoyed this book, I found it very interesting. It gave me a lot of new information. I learnt a lot about Marie Curie, her scientific work, the way she was inspired by the science, it gave me an insight how the scientists worked with each other. All this in an interesting historical background. I hadn't known too much about radioactivity, radioactive elements, nuclear physics before, but this book could describe these notions in a way which I could not only comprehend but also find very interesting.
Seeing Marie Curie's and her daughter's lives made me rethink if I fully live my life or I could do it better.
Seeing Marie Curie's and her daughter's lives made me rethink if I fully live my life or I could do it better.
August 25, 2016
This amazing biography picks up after the death of Pierre Curie and follows the life of Marie and her daughters, Irene and Eve, through two trips to America, WWII, and the end of their lives. The story is well told and covers matieral most readers may not be familiar with. A book that should encourage girls that a career in science is not only possible, but desirable.
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May 15, 2013I knew so little of Currie's children. Her girls are Amazing women on their own. I love stories about families and how much parents influence children...but despite all the genetics, and teaching ... Children are who they are. It's fun to watch them grow !
March 30, 2015
Before reading this (and another book on Madame Curie) I confess I knew little or nothing about her - except that she was a famous scientist. Now I know more about who she was as a person, and lots about her relationship with her daughters. What an amazing woman.
December 13, 2014
I enjoyed learning more about this accomplished woman and her accomplished daughters. 4 Nobels in the family! A very worthwhile read.
May 26, 2021
My older daughter did a wax museum project last year and chose to study Marie Curie. I was very interested in all that she learned about Marie Curie while she researched through books, articles, and movies. Science has always been the most interesting of all subjects to me, and so learning about a woman who won 2 Nobel Prizes for her contributions in science was especially interesting. This book tells of Marie’s personal and professional life. I read many things I’d already known about her discovery of radium and polonium, her time spent researching and experimenting with her husband Pierre in the lab, and the closeness she had with her sister Bronya, and her friendship with Albert Einstein. I did not know about her close friendship with Missy Maloney. The book explains how Missy and Marie shared a wonderful friendship across the ocean. Missy introduced Marie to America in a way that allowed Marie to stay in her comfort zone, but also come out of her shell. Marie took her daughters on a trip of a lifetime in America, spending weeks all over the country making appearances, giving speeches, greeting Americans, and enjoying places like Niagara Falls and the Grand Canyon. Thanks to Missy, Marie was able to raise the large amount of money needed to purchase radium to be used for research in her colleges in France and Poland. It was awesome to see how a widow in the early 1900’s was able to do so much.
The book talks about some of the health effects Marie and others experienced from working with radium. It describes what life was like and how it changed through WW1 and WW2. Beyond Marie’s life, the book describes adulthood for her daughters Irene (and husband Frederick), and Eve and details their experiences throughout the mid-1900’s. The author went through many letters that were written between Marie and Missy, Marie and her daughters, her daughters and Missy, etc. to tell the complete story of what it was like to be a woman, a scientist, a mother, and to deal with poor health, an exorbitant amount of work, and the side effects of socialism and the nazi regime. Parts of the story are told through Marie’s granddaughter as the book follows them in to modern times.
It’s amazing to think of all that Marie accomplished in the midst of circumstances that would cause others to give up. Without Marie’s diligence, x-Ray technology and radiation therapy would not have developed in that time period. Her success inspired many other scientists to make further discoveries. It’s so interesting to think how so many things would be different today if not for Marie Curie.
The book talks about some of the health effects Marie and others experienced from working with radium. It describes what life was like and how it changed through WW1 and WW2. Beyond Marie’s life, the book describes adulthood for her daughters Irene (and husband Frederick), and Eve and details their experiences throughout the mid-1900’s. The author went through many letters that were written between Marie and Missy, Marie and her daughters, her daughters and Missy, etc. to tell the complete story of what it was like to be a woman, a scientist, a mother, and to deal with poor health, an exorbitant amount of work, and the side effects of socialism and the nazi regime. Parts of the story are told through Marie’s granddaughter as the book follows them in to modern times.
It’s amazing to think of all that Marie accomplished in the midst of circumstances that would cause others to give up. Without Marie’s diligence, x-Ray technology and radiation therapy would not have developed in that time period. Her success inspired many other scientists to make further discoveries. It’s so interesting to think how so many things would be different today if not for Marie Curie.
October 25, 2020
The book cover with its antique test tube holder caught my attention. I was drawn as well by the sub-title of "The Private Lives of Science's First Family".
My childhood vision of Peter and Marie Curie slaving side-by-side as they worked on radiation, all the while poisoning their own bodies. That must have come from a poorly researched Weekly Reader!
In fairness, this is a biography of Marie. It touches more on her affair with a younger married man than on her marriage. More details on the Academy of Science in France denying her earned recognition.
The part I found intriguing was her trip to America to raise funds for her research. She did speaking engagements nearly from coast to coast. The author states that without the financial support of American women, Curie might not have been able to go on with her important research.
The many chapters (15), an in-depth bibliography, and detailed index show the labor put forth by the author to emphasize the contributions Curie made as to the aftereffects of radiation and the fame of this remarkable pioneer of the atom. Marie Curie literally sacrificed herself for the sake of deadly knowledge.
My childhood vision of Peter and Marie Curie slaving side-by-side as they worked on radiation, all the while poisoning their own bodies. That must have come from a poorly researched Weekly Reader!
In fairness, this is a biography of Marie. It touches more on her affair with a younger married man than on her marriage. More details on the Academy of Science in France denying her earned recognition.
The part I found intriguing was her trip to America to raise funds for her research. She did speaking engagements nearly from coast to coast. The author states that without the financial support of American women, Curie might not have been able to go on with her important research.
The many chapters (15), an in-depth bibliography, and detailed index show the labor put forth by the author to emphasize the contributions Curie made as to the aftereffects of radiation and the fame of this remarkable pioneer of the atom. Marie Curie literally sacrificed herself for the sake of deadly knowledge.
February 1, 2022
Really enjoyed this, it almost reads like a novel. Emling’s writing is very enjoyable.
As a mother of 4 daughters I love seeing the dynamics of mothers and daughters at play. Marie Curie’s life is well worth studying and discovering that her 2 daughters are just as interesting as her is a delight.
The last third of the book is devoted to the sisters as WW2 is breaking out and this wonderful quote by Eve I have fallen in love with:
“We discovered that peace at any price is no peace at all. We discovered that life at any price has no value whatever; that life is nothing without the privileges, the prides, the rights, the joys that make it worth living and also worth giving. And we also discovered that there is something more hideous more atrocious than war or than death and that is to live in fear.”
Eve Curie to the American Booksellers Association, NYC, April 9, 1940. Curie wanted America to enter the war and aide the Allies that were fighting Hitler.
I found this quote particularly apt to how governments, society, and people have responded to the Covid-19 pandemic the last 2 years.
Highly recommend!
As a mother of 4 daughters I love seeing the dynamics of mothers and daughters at play. Marie Curie’s life is well worth studying and discovering that her 2 daughters are just as interesting as her is a delight.
The last third of the book is devoted to the sisters as WW2 is breaking out and this wonderful quote by Eve I have fallen in love with:
“We discovered that peace at any price is no peace at all. We discovered that life at any price has no value whatever; that life is nothing without the privileges, the prides, the rights, the joys that make it worth living and also worth giving. And we also discovered that there is something more hideous more atrocious than war or than death and that is to live in fear.”
Eve Curie to the American Booksellers Association, NYC, April 9, 1940. Curie wanted America to enter the war and aide the Allies that were fighting Hitler.
I found this quote particularly apt to how governments, society, and people have responded to the Covid-19 pandemic the last 2 years.
Highly recommend!
March 22, 2019
This biography delves into the life of Marie Curie, particularly in her later years and how her two daughters lives were impacted by their famous mother. Irene became a scientist, while her younger daughter Eve became a journalist. The book also focuses on the impact of American journalist Missy Meloney and how she was instrumental in getting funding support for Marie and her institute, by promoting and arranging tours for the increasingly frail Marie as her work with radiation caught up with her body. The author goes into detail on how her discoveries revolutionized medicine, but she also includes how the use of radiation had its dark side, and how lack of regulation and understanding of the dangers led to some horrific deaths. The book covers the discrimination against Marie as a female scientist and also goes into the key discoveries by Irene. Eve’s contributions as a correspondent and humanitarian are also reviewed. I learned a great deal about this intriguing trio of women.
May 7, 2017
A wonderfully intimate book focusing on the later years of Marie's life and the full lives of her daughters. The books focuses particularly on Marie's relationship with America, and the journalist Missy Maloney. By looking at the later years, you get a better sense of how the Curies were not appreciated in their own time, but only posthumously. After Pierre's death, there was a campaign to kick Marie out of France (because she was a foreigner), and she was constantly maligned on the front page of the newspaper. Irene was actually put in jail in the US for being a communist. This book is full of all the hardships they overcame, but also highlights the strength of their family and their perseverance in pursuing not just scientific research, but campaigns of peace, public health, and women's rights.
September 20, 2020
I thoroughly enjoyed this book about Marie Curie and the rest of "science's first family". I liked how the author explained in the prologue that she didn't want to write just another book about Marie's fascinating discoveries, but about "the woman, mother and friend behind the pioneering scientist." I feel like I should have known way more about Marie, than I did. I was a woman in a man's field, getting my BS in aeronautical engineering, in the early 80s. Maybe cuz I was an engineer and not a scientist, but perhaps because so many women are left out of our education system's curricula at all levels and in so many disciplines. I had no idea she travelled to the US a fair bit and was treated like royalty. Her daughters were amazing individuals, as well. There is politics, humanity, equality (or lack thereof) and scientific breakthroughs.
March 24, 2018
Érdekes könyv volt. Még valamikor középiskolás koromban olvastam a hölgyről könyvet, de az főként a kutatásaira és a fiatalabb éveire koncentrált. Így ez a történet tulajdonképpen a másik felét mesélte el.
Számomra újdonság volt a családi életébe is bepillantani, de ez adta talán a legérdekesebb részleteket. Korábban nem sok helyen hallottam a lányairól, így érdekes volt végig követni, mi is lesz velük az életük során.
Csodálattal adózom a hölgynek, mert mindent megtett hogy egyensúlyban tartsa az életének fontos részeit: a kutatást, ami nélkül nem tudott volna élni, a családját: akik nélkül meg nem lett volna érdemes.
Számomra újdonság volt a családi életébe is bepillantani, de ez adta talán a legérdekesebb részleteket. Korábban nem sok helyen hallottam a lányairól, így érdekes volt végig követni, mi is lesz velük az életük során.
Csodálattal adózom a hölgynek, mert mindent megtett hogy egyensúlyban tartsa az életének fontos részeit: a kutatást, ami nélkül nem tudott volna élni, a családját: akik nélkül meg nem lett volna érdemes.
March 2, 2018
A biography best saved for those of a more scientific nature. While Emling does bring Madame Curie and her daughters to life, the amount of physics information she also included is intimidating. Perhaps though, that is what makes this such a definitive work on the Curies. With the exception of the younger daughter Eve, the members of this family had an all encompassing love of science, physics, and research.
While this really wasn’t a book for my. Tastes, it is well written and thorough. Readers of a more scientific inclination will undoubtedly enjoy reading it.
While this really wasn’t a book for my. Tastes, it is well written and thorough. Readers of a more scientific inclination will undoubtedly enjoy reading it.
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