He had a slow, foot-slogging imagination: he lived in dreams like all of us, but his dreams were sensible; they were obtuse, possible, contiguous to reality, not romantic, not cosmic. He did not experience my tormented oscillation between the heaven (of a scholastic or sports success, a new friendship, a rudimentary and fleeting love) and the hell (of a failing grade, a remorse, a brutal revelation of an inferiority which each time seemed eternal, definitive). His goals were always attainable. He dreamed of promotion and studied with patience things that did not interest him....
We had no doubts: we would be chemists, but our expectations and hopes were quite different. Enrico asked chemistry, quite reasonably, for the tools to earn his living and have a secure life. I asked for something entirely different; for me chemistry represented an indefinite cloud of future potentialities which enveloped my life to come in black volutes torn by fiery flashes, like those which had hidden Mount Sinai.
A charming and intelligent book by the great Italian writer and Nobel prize winner. The book is a biography, primarily of the writer's early life. Becoming a chemist, he is intrigued by elements of the periodic table, using them to create chapters for this book. The book has a little bit of everything from unusual facts to fascinating tales. Beautifully written, it is a pleasure to read.
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