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The Periodic Table
  • Published: 4 April 1995
  • ISBN: 9780805210415
  • Imprint: Knopf US
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $75.00

The Periodic Table

Formats & editions
Paperback
12 June 2012
Paperback
28 June 2010
Paperback
4 Apr 1995
Paperback
23 Oct 2000
Hardback
27 Oct 1995
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'So it happens, therefore, that every element says something to someone'

In this literary masterpiece, one of the twentieth century’s most significant writers reflects on his life before and after the Holocaust, merging the scientific and the humane into a profound “work of healing” (New York Times Book Review) • Fiftieth anniversary edition, with a new introduction by Rivka Galchen

As a youth, Primo Levi became fascinated by the laboratory, a site where the mysteries of the material world are unlocked and substances reveal their deepest truths. In this graceful, vital book—originally published in Italian in 1975—his passion for chemistry spans his extraordinary life story, with each chapter’s theme anchored in a different element of the periodic table. Beginning with his childhood in Italy’s Piedmontese Jewish community, Levi narrates his years as a student and fledgling scientist, before the descent of World War II, when he fought as an anti-fascist partisan until his arrest and transportation to Auschwitz. After surviving captivity, he returned to his work as a chemist and as a writer, striving in both realms to transmute matter into meaning. An artistic masterpiece of the highest order, The Periodic Table champions the power of friendship and curiosity to transcend times of tyranny and testifies to the fundamental interconnectedness of all the stuff of the universe—including us.
  • Published: 4 April 1995
  • ISBN: 9780805210415
  • Imprint: Knopf US
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $75.00
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About the author

Primo Levi

Primo Levi was born in Turin in 1919. The son of an educated middle-class Jewish family, he graduated with a degree in chemistry and found a job as a research chemist in Milan. In December 1943, he was arrested as part of the anti-fascist resistance and deported to Auschwitz. After the war, Levi resumed his career as a chemist, retiring only in 1975.

His graphic account of his time in Auschwitz, If This Is a Man, was published in 1947 and he went on to write many other books, including If Not Now, When? and The Periodic Table, emerging not only as one of the most profound and haunting commentators on the Holocaust, but as a great writer on many twentieth-century themes. In 1987, Primo Levi died in a fall that is widely believed to have been suicide.

PL

Also by Primo Levi

Primo Levi's The Periodic Table
The Survivor
The Magic Paint
A Tranquil Star
A Tranquil Star
Moments Of Reprieve
If Not Now, When?
See all

Praise for The Periodic Table

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