MARIE CURIE: Pioneer of the Atomic Age

Mme. Curie in tragicolor--oppressed, obsessed, oblivious to the world outside her ""horrible"" little laboratory--portrayed oh so purringly here. Manya in Poland, Marie in Paris, Me to her ill-mothered daughters, was once widowed, twice honored with the Nobel Prize, and ever chased by prying reporters--wherefrom she was rescued ""by an English friend who. . . cherished the frail and suffering woman back to some sort of health and strength again."" Between pre- and post-Curie glimpses of Science, an effete, defensive description of her idiosyncratic nature, with gratuitous observations on the ways of womankind: ""She once said, 'In science we must be interested in things, not persons.' And this is exactly the contrary viewpoint to that of most women."" Both the Bigland and Doorly books are variously better than this bathetic essay in unhappiness that strikes a singularly incongruous note when telling how a ""wonderful life came to an end.