Dunbar, the pilot of Catch 22, of Joseph Heller, that if time flies when you're having fun, the best way to slow down the passage of time is by making life as boring as possible.
That is not what you are going to get with this scholarly, exquisite book of Santiago Alvarez:De women, men and molecules. A book punctuated by unpublished veins in the history of science, and the best: how these veins connect with others, allowing us to see new forms emerge: laboratories, mirrors, etc.
An alphanumeric book
The world does not systematize its scenery with the same architectural capacity that a writer does. But Álvarez achieves it without resorting to fiction: he simply analyzes scientific reality from such wonderful aspects and angles. that highlight charms from the world of fantasy.
In other words: if you applied a stethoscope to me to listen to my heart rate while I was reading this work, you would notice my heart was racing with emotion.
That's why I have kept my eyes wide open all the time. And I have learned the unspeakable; In addition to the fact that Álvarez does his bit so that we forget to divide people into “literary” or “science” people, betting on an alphanumerism that only the epistemically hungry farm at the expense of academic divisions.
Without a doubt, essential, like another book in this collection that is already becoming one of my favorites: Science in literature, of Xavier Duran.
How do artists, writers and musicians view chemistry? And chemists, what vision do they have of topics as far apart as visual communication, magnetism, the image of a mirror or the relationship between music and alchemy? Of Women, Men and Molecules is located at the intersection of the sciences and the humanities, and brings together those two complementary views on us and the reality that surrounds us from a place little traveled, but no less necessary and creative. This is a popular book about chemistry, and at times it is also a history of philosophy, painting and music, and sometimes even an anecdote with which Santiago Álvarez allows us to look at the world with the eyes of a restless and observer. In short, from the different ways in which chemistry is present in literature and art.
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The news
Books that inspire us: 'Of women, men and molecules' by Santiago Álvarez
was originally published in
Xataka Science
by
Sergio Parra
.