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Title: Rosalind Franklin: The Dark Lady of DNA by Brenda Maddox ISBN: 0-06-018407-8 Publisher: HarperCollins Pub. Date: 01 October, 2002 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 5 (6 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Great scientist, good woman cheated of recognition...
Comment: Gee, it's amazing how little has changed over the past 50-odd years. They just released a report (National Science Foundation) showing how few women and minorities have places of importance in research and clinical science throughout the U.S. and her universities and corporations. It's a major struggle still to try to be a scientist, whether you are a woman, whether you are slightly older then the normal student, whether you are a racial minority, or an 'ability' minority. I should know: I was three of the above, and many of my professors in med school for Neuroscience (research) made my life miserable to the point of having to leave the program.
Rosalind Franklin accomplished a lot in her short life. She was a magnificent crystallographer: A science which is not used much anymore, but without whom we could not elucidated much in chemistry and biology. Unfortunately, she had many detractors, one of whom is James Watson. Those of us involved and embroiled in bioethics and disability do not have a very high opinion of this man anyway, because of statements made in the last few years involving genetics about 'getting rid of all the ugly women' and 'the lower IQ 10% in society" (there will always be a lower 10% no matter how many people you 'rid' society of until you get to just James Watson!). This book just confirmed that what I thought was the rantings of an old man, were actually the confirmed prejudices of a chauvinistic scientist.
If it had not been for Franklin, Watson and Crick would not have quickly reached their 'eureka' moment in determining the structure of DNA. The work of Franklin which was in for publishing was more or less handed to Watson and Crick, and her photography was seen by Watson without her permission. She walked into her office to find Watson going through her work...it's amazing that this information has not been recognized by now. Ethically, WAtson and Crick made use of her work, without giving her recognition. And since the Nobel Prize is not awarded posthumously, she was not included in the recognition. Makes you wonder if she had lived, given the obvious prejudice against women still in science, if she would have been recognized. Few women are. In fact, in the last few years, I cannot remember a single woman in science being recognized by the Nobel Committee.
It's time to rectify this injustice. I would hope and suggest that some other group such as Microsoft would provide a grant such as Nobel's that recognizes both minorities and women in science and technology whose work has provided much needed diversity in thought and in science (whether living or dead). The Prize could set up chairs or fund work in the name of Rosalind Franklin and provide the real history behind the discovery of DNA, as well as give her family the retroactive place of pride that they should have in her. Such a prize would also encourage young women and minorities, whether racial or ability or cultural, with the mentors they need to encourage them to go into science. Without diversity, the prejudices of a few become major social programs, especially in genetics. A return to eugenics would be less likely to happen if science is diverse.
Karen L. SAdler,
Science Education,
University of Pittsburgh
Rating: 5
Summary: Fragile Excellence
Comment: Brenda Maddox writes a book that amalgamates her subject's technical performance with her human frailties. She presents Rosalind Franklin as technically gifted and thorough to a degree most mortals would not comprehend, with a personality that is simultaneously beautiful & hostile, fragile & robust, all in the one human being.
What is refreshing is Maddox' honesty in dealing with her subject, and the intense warmth she brings to her. The counterpoint of Rosalind's scientific brilliance on the one hand and her vulnerability on the other makes her an absorbing character. She inspires as being prosaic at one level, artless at another and exceptionally diligent and intelligent.
But in the end Brenda Maddox leaves another message - that Rosalind Franklin despite her strengths and weaknesses, was beautifully human. And this is the refreshing part.
Rating: 5
Summary: Fine biography of both life and times
Comment: This is a fine biography that both covers Franklin's life very well and provides a solid sketch of the world she lived in, without going into the endless detail that some "life and times" biographies do. The book provides a clear understanding of who Franklin was and how she acted, both good and bad. She was a brilliant scientist and a warm, caring friend to many; on the other side she was a perfectionist (it goes with the brilliance) and an intellectual snob. It's the task of biography to show us the whole person, and this book does that.
The book also provides a fascinating description of the world of postwar science in Britain. It was still the era of "small science" in which brilliant individuals made major discoveries while working in cramped, dirty conditions with minimal facilities and what now seem absurdly small budgets. Individual scientists still designed their own equipment (one of Franklin's early contributions was the design of an improved X-ray camera) and still spent endless days on pencil-and-paper mathematical computations unless they were lucky enough to get permission from the budget gods to hire a "computer" human to do the arithmetic for them.
By covering Franklin's career in detail, Maddox makes clear that her work on DNA was only part of her career, and probably not the most important part. When she died the arc of her career was still climbing. Had Franklin lived she would have been a likely candidate for a Nobel Prize based not on her role in DNA but on research done later by her own team of researchers under her own direction. Her death at age 37 cutting her career short was a loss to all human society.
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Title: Rosalind Franklin and DNA by Anne Sayre ISBN: 0393320448 Publisher: W.W. Norton & Company Pub. Date: July, 2000 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: The Double Helix : A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA by James D. Watson ISBN: 074321630X Publisher: Touchstone Books Pub. Date: 12 June, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: DNA : The Secret of Life by Andrew Berry, James D. Watson ISBN: 0375415467 Publisher: Knopf Pub. Date: 01 April, 2003 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: The Third Man of the Double Helix: The Autobiography of Maurice Wilkins by Maurice Wilkins ISBN: 0198606656 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: November, 2003 List Price(USD): $27.50 |
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Title: Genes, Girls, and Gamow: After the Double Helix by James D. Watson ISBN: 0375727159 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 07 January, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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