Author offers insight into Galileo, his daughter

Author offers insight into Galileo, his daughter

BY ROBERT STANTON
Special to the Rice News

For much of
her career, award-winning writer Dava Sobel has delved into
the complexities of life, successfully translating them
into a digestible form that ultimately gives them new life.

A former New
York Times science reporter, Sobel has focused her natural
curiosity on some of the greatest thinkers of the world,
providing us a glimpse of their fascinating lives and the
challenges they faced.

She shared some
of her insights about her latest book, “Galileo’s
Daughter,” before an appreciative audience at the Rice
Memorial Center’s Grand Hall Oct. 30 as part of the
Rice University President’s Lecture Series.

In “Galileo’s
Daughter,” Sobel reveals the Renaissance scientist’s
relationship with his illegitimate elder daughter, Sister
Maria Celeste, a Poor Clare nun. In researching the book,
Sobel traveled to Italy four times and translated more than
120 letters from Sister Maria Celeste to her father.

Sobel said she
was surprised to learn that Galileo had a daughter who was
a nun, given his hardships with the church. Because of his
belief that the Earth moves around the sun, Galileo was
accused of heresy by the Holy Office of the Inquisition
in Rome, banished to Siena and placed under house arrest
in Florence.

Galileo, who
was never married, also fathered a son, Vincenzio, and another
daughter, Livia. His eldest daughter, Virginia, took vows
as Sister Maria Celeste.

Through her
many letters to her father, Sobel said Galileo’s daughter
showed a loving and protective rapport with him. While she
had a role as a nun, Sister Maria Celeste also had duties
to him as his daughter, as evidenced by her concerns about
her father’s chronic illnesses that included gout,
hernia and ocular infections.

Sobel’s
1995 book “Longitude” explored the life of John
Harrison, an 18th century British clock maker who invented
a timepiece crucial to navigation. It became an international
best seller and has been translated into more than 20 foreign
languages.

“Longitude” won several awards, including the Harold D. Vursell Memorial
Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Book
of the Year in England and significant awards in France
and Italy.

Sobel was made
a fellow of the National Geographic Society in recognition
of the book, which was adapted for television in “Lost
at Sea—The Search For Longitude.”

Sobel has lectured
at the Smithsonian Institution, the NASA Goddard Flight
Center, the Folger Shakespeare Library, the New York Public
Library and the Royal Geographical Society in London, among
others.

She also has
appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including
National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,”
C-SPAN’s “Booknotes,” NBC’s “The
Today Show” and ABC’s “World News Tonight.”

— Robert
Stanton is a free-lance writer.