Each chapter is named for an element; some chapters are autobiographical, some are essays, some are vignettes of people he knew and their careers in chemistry; two are short stories about metal prospecting and mining with hints of fantasy. Most are autobiographical and through these we learn a bit of his childhood; his boyish fascination with chemistry experiments which grew into his college education and career as a chemist; his puppy loves and courtship and his imprisonment in a labor camp during WW II. Theres a lot about language derivation, especially of names. For example, the mixed Jewish/Piedmontese dialect in the fabric shops of that Italian region gave Italy a lot of its fabric terms. And he worries that while he can speak it (Piedmontese, essentially a spoken language), it loses its authenticity from his book learning rather than native fluency. Its fascinating to learn things such as urstoff in German means element or primal substance.Heres a quote chemists will love: the nobility of Man, acquired in a hundred centuries of trial and error, lay in making himself the conqueror of matter.We even have a passage about fake news: how could he ignore the fact that the chemistry and physics on which we fedwere the antidote to Fascismbecause they were clear and distinct and verifiable at every step, and not a tissue of lies and emptiness, like the radio and newspapers? Apparently fake news is a theme of the great Italian writers of this era because it reminds me of a related passage I quoted recently from Italo Calvinos If on a Winters Night a Traveler: Were in a country where everything that can be falsified has been falsified: paintings in museums, gold ingots, bus tickets. The counterrevolution and the revolution fight with salvos of falsification: the result is that no one can be sure what is true and what is false, the political police simulate revolutionary actions and the revolutionaries disguise themselves as policemen. Occasionally there is a theme of chemical mixing and the mixing of Jewish and Christian culture. The author was forced to work as a chemist in the Auschwitz labor camp. He later corresponded with his German supervisor at the camp. Several passages deal with the tense relationship between the Italian fascists and the Jews such as: one could be polite, one could even help him [a Jew], and even boast (cautiously) about having helped him, but it was not advisable to have human relations with him, nor to compromise oneself too deeply, so as not to be forced later to offer understanding or compassion. Levi could not receive his college degree since awarding a degree to Jews was prohibited; nor could he initially get a job since the racial laws forbade it. The author makes some humorous but nasty comments about librarians. With apologies to the many users on GR who are librarians, heres one passage: The librarianpresided over the library like a watchdog, one of those poor dogs that are deliberately made vicious by being chained up and given little to eat; or better, like the old, toothless cobra, pale because of centuries of darknessshe was small, without breasts or hips, waxen, wilted, and monstrously myopicShe gave the impression of never having been young, although she was certainly not more than thirty, and having been born there, in the shadows, in that vague odor of mildew and stale airshe stank of mothballs and looked constipated."I read somewhere this was the greatest science book ever written. No, I prefer Richard Feynman, but its pretty good. Translated from the Italian. photo of Primo Levi from itascabile.com

There are so-called inert gases in the air we breathe. They bear curious Greek names of erudite derivation which mean "the New", "the Hidden", "the Inactive", and "the Alien".Thus begins Primo Levi's book of a score or so mini-memoirs. Each of these is named for one of the elements, thus the name of the book. The elements used are in no particular order not alphabetical, not by atomic number (the ordering of elements in the periodic table). They range from Argon (the first chapter) to Carbon (the last), from Hydrogen to Uranium, from Nitrogen to Arsenic.Each of Levi's unnumbered chapters is launched with something about the element used for its name. "Argon" begins with the sentence above, and continues for a rather lengthy paragraph along these lines, ending with " argon (the Inactive) is present in the air in the considerable proportion of 1 per cent, that is, twenty or thirty times more abundant [by volume] than carbon dioxide, without which there would not be a trace of life on this planet."But then the next paragraph (in "Argon") begins The little that I know about my ancestors presents many similarities to these gases. Not all of them were materially inert, for that was not granted them. On the contrary, they were or had to be quite active, in order to earn a living and because of a reigning morality that held that "he who does not work does not eat." But there is no doubt that they were inert in their inner spirits, inclined to disinterested speculation, witty discourses, elegant, sophisticated, and gratuitous discussion. It can hardly be by chance that all the deeds attributed to them, though quite various, have in common a touch of the static, an attitude of dignified abstention, of voluntary (or accepted) relegation to the margins of the great river of life. Noble, inert, and rare: their history is quite poor when compared to that of other illustrious Jewish communities in Italy and Europe Here ends my newer update to original review, continuing below - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -I read this book several years ago, and every so often see something about it here on GR. Perhaps I will write a real review someday, but I would need to re-read it.(For a real review of Levi's book here on Goodreads, check out https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...) Levi is well known as a survivor of Auschwitz, a writer of great talent and great humanity. He died (a probable suicide) in 1987.I thought what I'd do here is give a link to a recent article in the New Yorker by James Wood. It's basically a Levi retrospective, and (without mentioning the new book at all, unless I missed it in a sentence) presumably written to coincide with The Complete Works of Primo Levi, published about a week ago in three slip-cased volumes, with an Introduction by Toni Morrison.Wood discusses The Periodic Table extensively in the piece, and also writes movingly of Levi's memoirs, available together in If This Is a Man / The Truce.http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/201.... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Previous review: Ornament of the WorldRandom review: Classics for PleasureNext review: Almost No Memory Lydia DavisPrevious library review: My Brilliant Friend Elena FerranteNext library review: The Wine-Dark Sea

I wasnt quite sure if The Periodic Table was right for me when I started reading it. I couldnt find my pace and felt distractedly unaligned as I kept getting slowed down by the profusion of Hebrew/Piedmontese derivatives reigning in the first pages of the book. But that feeling was short-lived and quickly dissipated. Levi has proved to be a true master of storytelling his narrative flows effortlessly and gives birth to the passages whose delicate matter shimmers with charm and mythical splendour. The author shows taste for the wonderfully bizarre, generous and tenacious. His book is full of skeptical but good-natured people wrapped in a veil of family histories that make one smile with benevolent indulgence. Every person he includes in his storytelling becomes an elusive but substantial part of the human constellation and its force majeure. His mind of a chemist makes him see the world as a miracle derived from the reactive momentum, a life-bearing effusion that culminates in a multitude of fascinating by-products. This world is diverse and capable of giving rise to an inspiring change, it is full of kaleidoscopic enchantment and disapproval for the static. It is simply a place where contrasts prevail over resemblance and in this sense Mendeleevs Periodic Table and the fantastical dissimilitude of its components act as an allegory of the human race and its stimulating heterogeneity.Oscillating between scientific insight and sanguine merriment, The Periodic Table is an eloquent tale of momentary explosions and perennial effects. Through the fibre of his school, work, concentration camp and post-war years, the author weaves a tale that gives hope and courage. There is no sense of inconsolable despair here, despite the fact that Levis reconciliation with life takes place in a world that is an embodiment of apathy and destruction. This book is the antidote to Fascism and emptiness of the years that were defined by it and I find it very beautiful how in Levis mind moral strength and endurance align with the raggedly majestic ridges of the Italian Alps where one does not surrender to incomprehensible matter but faces passivity and conquers it. Life is a choice. A deliberation. Everything in it is a wonder waiting to be revealed to us. We so often search for greatness while in fact it is the most ordinary little things and everyday acts that have the power to replicate the content of a burning star. The Periodic Table shows us how to open up to a whole universe of untold miracles despite ones proclivity for inertia and accompanying sense of individual helplessness. In few words, this beautiful book is an act of distilling a time slowing, purifying ritual in which we obtain the essence.

Although the Periodic Table is recognized by the Royal Institute of Britain as the best science book ever written, it really not a science book. Its a memoir, it is philosophy, and it is written by gentle soul. The book arrived with high praise from Bellow, Roth, Calvino and Eco.It came 30 years after Primo Levis famous If This is Man (or 'Survival in Auschwitz in the US) which was written in 1946, almost immediately after his 11 months in Auschwitz. He said he wrote it because he had a moral duty and a psychological need to bear witness to what he experienced. He and other inmates feared no one would believe what was being done. Plus, he said all the very best men died in the camps. (Levi survived only because his education as a chemist was useful in making synthetic rubber.) His fears were on target and for ten years there was no interest in his story. His writing is vastly different than Wiesel and his background in science lends for a very calm, dispassionate, almost detached reporting of his factual observations, but he was always searching for reasons. For example, he concluded the excesses in violence were probably done to dehumanize the victims so the oppressors would feel less guilt about their murders.Periodic Table is more contemplative than 'If this is Man' and devotes only one chapter to Auschwitz. Levi reminisces about his early life in school as a very shy, awkward youth, the joy he found in science, and his respect for working, especially the pleasure of problem-solving. Separated by 30 years from the events of the 1940s, there is more serenity, more reflection and more follow-up conclusions - this is not an angry or brooding book.In 1987 at age 67, Levi fell four stories from his balcony and died. The coroner ruled it suicide and his biographers generally agree. There was no suicide note; however, he had just finished his last book, The Drowned and the Saved. Some say the book was his suicide note as he wrote: . . . this injury cannot be healed. Levi told of a dream full of horror (that) has still not ceased to visit me, at sometimes frequent, sometimes longer, intervals. . . I am sitting at a table with my family, or with friends, or at work, or in the green countryside . . . yet I feel a deep and subtle anguish, the definite sensation of an impending threat . . . everything collapses, and disintegrates around me, the scenery, the walls, the people, while the anguish becomes more intense and more precise. Now everything has changed into chaos; I am alone in the center of a grey and turbid nothing, and now, I know what this thing means, and I also know that I have always known it; I am in the Lager (the death camp) once more, and nothing is true outside the Lager.Upon hearing of his death, Elie Wiesel said: Primo Levi died at Auschwitz forty years earlier.Levi was actually a secular humanist. He said 'I was not a believer; I am not now a believer. Spirit is something you cant touch. At that time it seemed to me an official lie insisting upon something you cant experience with your eyes, your ears, with your fingers. He was sent to Auschwitz because of his Jewish heritage.He was a man of the rational era, someone who took pleasure in the wonders of the world believing everything around him was a mystery to be solved, someone who sought to understand suffering in the world, someone who wrote with a calmness and with integrity.An extraordinary book.

Certo, che avrei cercato l'oro [] per ritrovare il mio mestiere chimico nella sua forma essenziale e primordiale, la «Scheidekunst», appunto, l'arte di separare il metallo dalla ganga.Questa per Primo Levi è l'essenza del mestiere di chimico: separare il metallo dalla ganga. Si potrebbe dire che il compito dello scrittore è lo stesso, e cioè vagliare il caos (la ganga) del vissuto per dargli una forma coerente e tirarne fuori quanto vi si trova di valido (il metallo). Non a caso, Saul Bellow, citato sul retro della copertina, ha definito questo libro meravigliosamente puro, e questo conferma l'abilità di Levi nel fare il proprio mestiere. È una raccolta che unisce le due anime di Primo Levi, quella del chimico e quella dello scrittore, e supera la separazione tra i suoi due mestieri (a riprova del fatto che la cultura non è per forza umanistica o scientifica). L'amore per la chimica, affrontata come un'avventura, e quello per la scrittura, condotta con uno stile limpido e personale, hanno in questo libro lo stesso peso, sono complementari e si sostengono a vicenda.Commovente l'umanità di questo scrittore, attento anche alle sfumature più lievi dell'animo umano e lontano anni luce dalla retorica e dal pensiero semplicistico: la complessità è insita nella vita, e anche quando non la si comprende fino in fondo bisogna tenerne conto. Non ci sono sagome o tipi stereotipati, in questo libro, ma solo personaggi credibili, non tanto, o non solo, perché realmente vissuti, ma perché descritti con tratti profondamente umani. E questo lo si deve all'onestà di Primo Levi come scrittore: non c'è un solo pensiero, una sola frase, che non venga dalla profondità del suo sentire, nessun ghirigoro di troppo, ogni parola, ogni segno sulla carta, è essenziale. Per me una delle vette della letteratura italiana.