Marie Curie: A Life

I've admired Marie Curie (born Maria Sklowdowska in Russian-occupied Poland) longer than I can remember, quite literally. I first read her biography in a "written for children" edition while I was in grade school - Grade 5, perhaps? When I sat in my first day of Laboratory Chemistry class, as a high school junior, I bit my tongue half off as the teacher included this gem of wisdom in his opening remarks: "I know you girls are only taking this class because you need it to get into college. I'll go easy on you. After all, there are very few Marie Curies in the world!" I still wish I'd had the guts to be sent to the office for saying the words that rose up without my bidding them: "And just as few Pierre Curies, Mr. ****." Anyway, perhaps that anecdote offers a clue as to how much Madame Curie's biographies have meant to me as I've read them over the years. This most recently published one draws on materials not available to previous biographers, letters and journals that were sealed until 1990. While it's hard to beat Eve Curie's 1937 biography of her mother (after all, who knew the woman better?), Susan Quinn's scholarly work adds illumination in plenty because of those additional resources. This biography tries to be all things to all readers, and that may be cited as a flaw although it's also clearly a virtue. Readers who are primarily or entirely interested in Marie Curie, the individual human being, are likely to slog through the lengthy and detailed descriptions of scientific work while yawning. Readers who want to know about Marie Curie, the scientist, are apt to be bored or even annoyed by the passages that concern her relationships with parents, siblings, husband, children, and (once, during her widowhood) lover. For me, though, it all fit together beautifully. Madame Curie was all of those things, after all. Scientist, daughter, sister, wife, mother, and friend. I'm interested now, just as I was at age 10, in all those aspects of her life.

This book has excellent historical information about Poland and Marie Curie's family before she was born and after. It gives a very good description of her life growing up and her family, as well as personal experiences gleaned from unpublished letters. It brings information hitherto unpublished about her personal life, and it presents her career in a fascinating way. I cannot rate the book highly enough.

Susan Quinn does a wonderful job of describing the hurdles that Curie's family had to overcome during the occupation of Poland by Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The interesting fact is that all of her siblings were bright and well educated despite the denial of public education. Reading this book has been a delightful experience.

Growing up in Poland, being interested in science and scientists and loving biographies "made me" reach for Susan Quinn book, Marie Curie: A life. A life,...what an accurate title! The book is about one of the scientists of its (and even current) times, but it is titled modestly, "...:A life". This means, Susan Quinn introduced this intriguing woman as a normal, day to day character. Such "normalcy" did not take away my admiration and inspiration in my own professional pursuits. She, the author, simply presented an extra-ordinary woman in a very ordinary way, just as if she, Maria Sklodowska-Curie, were your or mine neighboor. The language of the biography is percise but also nostalgic. Susan Quinn proved to be excellent researcher and "mood creator". She was able to write as if she was walking in Sklodowska-Curie shoes. She captured non-essential detail that took a reader right in the middle of the action. The details she used were accurate and true. It brought a Polish reader back to Warsaw. There, the streets were just as she described them, the smell and noise and politics of XIX and XX c Poland were so accuratly painted that as I continued reading it I could no longer remember I was in USA. I thought I were at Nowolipki street or Saxon Garden. Memories of my country history and history of scientific world were rekindled in my heart. This is a very rich book. It will bring memories or create some for those who are not familiar with scientific revolution of Europe in late XIXc and early XXc. It is a book about heroism, loyalty, determination, passion, love and friendship. It is also a book about rejection in professional world. But most of all, this book is about victory of one extraordinary woman. This is the only woman ever who received two Nobel Prizes. And she happened to come from a country that was constantly occupied by its oppresors, from Poland. Both the author and the heroin did a fantastic job.

As a woman scientist myself, and a long time admirer of the work of the Curies, I was struck by how much this book allows us to see beyond the legend, to the heart of Marie Curie. She emerges as a fascinating, brilliant individual of great depth, and a woman who endured great losses and emotional trials. Her character, emotional depth and her ability to follow her own moral code are what struck me most deeply. While her work has been greatly appreciated in the latter half of the 20th Century, the neglect and condemnation heaped on her in her day is not well known. It makes her accomplishments all the more remarkable and due our respect. This very fine biography should be on every scientists' bookshelf.