March 09, 2008

American-born writer, David Bodanis is the author of several popular science books and the winner of the Royal Society’s Aventis Prize for Science Books. What ranks him amongst the most exciting and informative authors of our time is his ability to encapsulate scientific theories beyond the understanding of the common individual and present them in a lucid, comprehendible manner.

His latest book, Passionate Minds: The great scientific affair which traces one of history’s most profound romances that later became the basis of the ideas of Enlightenment has surpassed his previous literary achievements.

It is a cliché that behind every great man is an even greater woman. This cannot be more true for Europe’s greatest writer and philosopher, Voltaire who is attributed with laying the foundations of the continent’s most significant revolution, The French Revolution. In the book, Bodanis describes, through the racy love story, how this great man was ‘bested by a woman intellectually superior to him.’

For the better part, history has concealed the existence of one of the world’s most crucial female scientists, the invincible Emilie du Chatelet. The pre-Enlightenment times in which she lived did not encourage any female role in science which was thought of purely as the domain of the male gender. But the teenage Emilie was unusually bright and to pursue her interest and education in mathematics she had to fight the conservative norms of French aristocratic society. Till he was alive, her uncommonly enlightened elderly father supported her inquisitiveness and brought tutors home for her to study with. All this while her mother was horrified at her daughter’s direction when all she wanted for Emilie was to marry into a rich aristocratic family which she soon did in order to escape spending the rest of her life in a convent.

As customary, Marquise Florent-Claude was well aware that he and his wife would lead quite separate lives. It wasn’t long before Emilie wanted to reopen the door to science. But the stark reality of her gender and her father’s demise frustrated her. No woman in Europe was allowed to enter a university, let alone the Academie des Science in Paris. Her understanding husband facilitated her move back to Paris, where, in order to overcome her isolation, she started associating with other women but most of them were illiterate, let alone have any similar interests, and frowned on that fact that she ‘preferred the study of the most abstract science to more agreeable knowledge.’

At age 21, Emilie’s fortunes took a turn for the better when she met the most sought after man in France. ‘It wasn’t Voltaire, rather the one man Voltaire often said he wanted to be: Louis-Francois Armand du Plissés, the great nephew of the famous Cardinal de Richelieu.’ Their affair, as passionate as it was, did not last long after Emilie realised that this wasn’t the man who would take her forward in her study of science. Her continued search for such a partner ended when she was introduced to Voltaire by common friends who thought they might like each other. Verily, the two were so spellbound by each other that they became lovers instantly. Voltaire couldn’t help but wonder ‘what kind of God had created this delightful woman, still just 27.’

In Voltaire, Emilie found a man with whom she had nothing to hide. She had become very interested in Newton’s theories and was able to understand and use his new mathematical techniques of calculus. She showed Voltaire through her calculations how the planets revolved like clockwork and he was overawed by her intellect.

The influence of his scientist lover was such that Voltaire’s creativity was lifted to an even higher level. To his astonishment, ‘Emilie was brighter than him, as Voltaire was the first to admit.’
 

In Voltaire, Emilie found a man from whom she had nothing to hide. She had become very interested in Newton’s theories and was able to understand and use his new mathematical techniques of calculus. She showed Voltaire through her calculations how the planets revolved like clockwork and he was overawed by her intellect.
 

To pursue their collective study of science and theology, Emilie and Voltaire withdrew to Emilie’s husband’s inherited home, the Chateau de Cirey, 150 miles east of Paris. They first began a through study of the Bible since most of the laws in France at the time were derived from divine revelations. ‘In their fresh investigations of the Bible, Emilie was especially good at catching illogicalities’ which we know now were metaphors and not mysteries as they were then understood as. This questioning of long held believes was one of the fundamental acts of Enlightenment.

Their purpose of study was not to find surface faults to reject the Bible, for if they had done so ‘they would have been as closed-minded as the individuals they were critiquing.’ The study of Bible led them to a comparative study of world cultures and societies and eventually back to Newton’s findings, reconstructing the procedures he had described. Their collective research was penned by Voltaire in a work titled The Elements of Newton which had only his name on the title ‘as was the usual order of things’ but there was ‘the most graceful of acknowledgements’ to Emilie saying ‘the fruit of your worthy aid is what I now offer to the public.’

In 1737, Academie des Science in Paris announced a prize competition to determine the nature of heat, light and fire on which Emilie and Voltaire started working independently. Emilie wanted the Academy’s highest acclaim so that she could ‘stand out from the crowd, and… be taken seriously by the judges,’ while Voltaire wanted it so that he could justify his shift from literature to science. Even though neither of them won the prize, Emilie because of her original ideas which were based on ‘Newton’s foreign and disturbingly new system’ which was resisted by the French conservatives and also her gender, they were both given special recommendations.

When their research was published it became clear which submission had been the best and according to Maupertuis, France’s most famous scientist at the time, it was hard to believe that the award was given to someone else. Emilie had finally made a mark and received the recognition she so desperately craved.

Over the years, a few cracks did appear in their relationship but were never sufficient to separate them long enough. In Voltaire, Emilie found a man ‘to whom I happily subjugated my soul,’ and to Voltaire, Emilie meant more ‘than father, brother, or son.’ Voltaire eventually retreated to his familiar territory of writing. ‘I used to teach myself with you, but now you have flown up where I can no longer follow,’ he lamented.

Passionate Minds is a deeply, avidly and fondly researched book. Critics have noted Bodanis’s over-colloquial style, plebeian generalities and exaggerated scholarly solidity but those faults are minor and easily forgivable. Credit should not be taken away from Bodanis for he has so fascinatingly introduced to us such an influential female scientist from whose work Einstein derived the c2 of his famous equation E=mc2 and the lady who inspired some of Voltaire’s best work.

The book is a fascinating portrait of the affiliation between two creative geniuses whose profound contributions are as strongly felt today as they did in the 18th century.
 

Passionate Minds
By David Bodanis
Little, Brown Book Group, UK
Available with Paramount Books, Karachi
ISBN 0-349-11907-6
312pp. Rs745