The Radium Woman

The Radium Woman is a biography of the scientist Marie Curie written for children by Eleanor Doorly. It was published in 1939 and was the first non-fiction book to be awarded the Carnegie Medal. Woodcuts by Robert Gibbings illustrated each chapter.^[1] Hesperides Press republished the biography in 2006.^[2]

The Radium Woman was based on Ève Curie's biography of her mother, which was published in 1938. In the foreword the author explains:

"The life of Madame Curie has been written by her daughter with a charm and beauty never surpassed. It is therefore with the deepest humility that I have ventured to make out of that lovely book a shorter tale for young people. People ought not to wait till they are over sixteen to make the acquaintance of the greatest and most delightful human beings and to hear of the world's greatest deeds."

Contents

The first seven chapters concern Marie Curie's early life, which was spent in a Poland unwillingly incorporated into the Russian Empire. The book begins with the five-year-old Manya Sklodovski in her family home in Warsaw, already aware of the power of the Russian officials, and later describes the ten-year-old schoolgirl's experience of secretly learning forbidden Polish history with her class. Her surroundings and the incidents of her life are vividly described and her early brilliance unforcedly exhibited. Other chapters concern the fourteen-year-old Manya learning that a friend's brother is to be executed as a rebel, and her year's holiday after finishing High School at sixteen, time spent in the country and the mountains.

The biography continues through the early difficult days of making a living by teaching, supporting her sister who was studying medicine in Paris, starting an illegal Polish school for peasant children in the country, and an unhappy love affair. Then after a brief sojourn in Belgium come her own days of study both in Paris and in Warsaw. "That was the part of Marie's life she loved best, her hard student days, when, working in poverty and alone, with all the power of her youth, she was most herself." ^[3]

Her meeting with Pierre Curie which led to marriage and the flowering of her career, and the great discoveries which changed the face of science and earned the Nobel Prize, occupy the central chapters of the book. At each step the text is peppered with descriptions of her daily life and small significant incidents to make the story come alive for the young reader.

Carnegie Medal

The awarding of the Carnegie Medal for 1939 to The Radium Woman is said to have been made over the heads of the committee, who had decided not to make an award that year, affected by recent criticism and by the coming of war.^[4]

References