To Father by Sister Maria Celeste
The story of Galileo's daughter, Sister Maria Celeste, as told through her letters to her father. A companion to the bestselling "Galileo's Daughter", the letters are edited and introduced by Dava Sobel. Galileo Galilei was at the heart of the most dramatic collision in history between science and religion. But the great Italian scientist was also a loving father who treasured his illegitimate daughter, Virginia. She was perhaps her father's equal in brilliance, industry and sensibility, and became his greatest source of strength during his most difficult years. Now readers can follow their story, as she told it, in this volume of her surviving 124 letters to Galileo. Both in their original Italian and translated into English by the author of "Galileo's Daughter", these letters still speak in the present tense, suspended in the urgency of their once current affairs. Galileo's daughter led a cloistered life in a gilded age. Since there could be no hope of marriage for her, at 13 she entered a convent near Florence to spend the rest of her days within its walls as Sister Maria Celeste. Her letters span a decade, from 1623 to 1633. In that period, a new Pope battled the Protestant Reformation and filled Rome with artistic monuments. The Thirty Years' War embroiled all of Europe. The bubonic plague erupted from Germany, ravaging Florence until stemmed by a miracle. And a new philosophy of science threatened to overturn the order of the universe. Maria Celeste's evocative letters touch on all of these situations, but they dwell in the small details of everyday life. Through them, the man generally thought to have defied the Catholic Church is seen to depend on the prayers of a pious daughter.
'Sobel is a stunning talent that continues to sparkle and interest us all as much as the subjects she writes about' Guardian
Dava Sobel is the author of the international bestsellers Longitude and Galileo's Daughter, which won a Christopher Award and a Los Angeles Times Book Prize. She was awarded the National Science Board's 2001 Public Service Award, and the 2001 Bradford Washburn Award from the Museum of Science in Boston. She is also an award-winning former science reporter for the New York Times and writes frequently about science for several magazines, including The New Yorker, Audubon, Discover, Life and Omni.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9781841157252 |
| ISBN 10 | 1841157252 |
| Title | To Father |
| Author | Sister Maria Celeste |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | HarperCollins Publishers |
| Year published | 2002-10-07 |
| Number of pages | 512 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |