The Elements of Marie Curie

Dava Sobel, acclaimed and bestselling author of Longitude, chronicles the life and work of the most famous woman in the history of science – and the untold story of the young women who trained in her laboratory.

‘A luminous and illuminating contribution to the cause’ Literary Review

For decades, Marie Curie was the only woman in the room at international scientific gatherings, and despite constant illness, she travelled far and wide to share the secrets of radioactivity, a term she coined. She is still the only person to win a Nobel Prize in two scientific fields.

Her ingenuity extended far beyond the laboratory walls; grieving the death of her husband, Pierre, she took his place as professor of physics at the Sorbonne, devotedly raised two daughters, drove a van she outfitted with x-ray equipment to the front lines of World War I, befriended Albert Einstein, and inspired generations of young women to pursue science as a way of life.

Approaching Marie Curie from a unique angle, Sobel navigates her remarkable discoveries and fame alongside the women who became her legacy – from Norway’s Ellen Gleditsch and France’s Marguerite Perry, who discovered the element francium, to her own daughter, Irene, a Nobel Prize winner in her own right. The Elements of Marie Curie deftly illuminates the trailblazing life and enduring influence of one of the most consequential figures of our time.

‘A book for our times celebrating both science and women’ Sir Paul Nurse, geneticist and Nobel Prize winner

‘Hard to put down! A wonderfully written biography’ Professor Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, astrophysicist

‘A lucid, literate biography, celebrating a scientific exemplar who, for all her fame, deserves to be better known’ Kirkus