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Primo Levi: The Matter of a Life
From the prizewinning Jewish Lives series, the first intellectual biography of Primo Levi to describe the intersection of his roles as both chemist and writer
In 1943, twenty-four-year-old Primo Levi had just begun a career in chemistry when, after joining a partisan group, he was captured by the Italian Fascist Militia and deported to Auschwitz. Of the 650 Italian Jews in his transport, he was one of fewer than 25 who survived the eleven months before the camp’s liberation. Upon returning to his native Turin, Levi resumed work as a chemist and was employed for thirty years by a company specializing in paints and other chemical coatings. Yet soon after his return to Turin, he also began writing—memoirs, essays, novels, short stories, poetry—and it is for this work that he has won international recognition. His first book, If This Is a Man , issued in 1947 after great difficulty in finding a publisher, remains a landmark document of the twentieth century. Berel Lang's groundbreaking biography shines new light on Levi’s role as a major intellectual and literary figure—an important Holocaust writer and witness but also an innovative moral thinker in whom his two roles as chemist and writer converged, providing the “matter” of his life. Levi’s writing combined a scientist’s attentiveness to structure and detail, an ironic imagination that found in all nature an ingenuity at once inviting and evasive, and a powerful and passionate moral imagination. Lang’s approach provides a philosophically acute and nuanced analysis of Levi as thinker, witness, writer, and scientific detective.
About Jewish Lives:
Jewish Lives is a prizewinning series of interpretative biography designed to explore the many facets of Jewish identity. Individual volumes illuminate the imprint of Jewish figures upon literature, religion, philosophy, politics, cultural and economic life, and the arts and sciences. Subjects are paired with authors to elicit lively, deeply informed books that explore the range and depth of the Jewish experience from antiquity to the present.
In 2014, the Jewish Book Council named Jewish Lives the winner of its Jewish Book of the Year Award, the first series ever to receive this award.
More praise for Jewish Lives:
"Excellent." –New York Times
"Exemplary." –Wall Street Journal
"Distinguished." –New Yorker
"Superb." –The Guardian
In 1943, twenty-four-year-old Primo Levi had just begun a career in chemistry when, after joining a partisan group, he was captured by the Italian Fascist Militia and deported to Auschwitz. Of the 650 Italian Jews in his transport, he was one of fewer than 25 who survived the eleven months before the camp’s liberation. Upon returning to his native Turin, Levi resumed work as a chemist and was employed for thirty years by a company specializing in paints and other chemical coatings. Yet soon after his return to Turin, he also began writing—memoirs, essays, novels, short stories, poetry—and it is for this work that he has won international recognition. His first book, If This Is a Man , issued in 1947 after great difficulty in finding a publisher, remains a landmark document of the twentieth century. Berel Lang's groundbreaking biography shines new light on Levi’s role as a major intellectual and literary figure—an important Holocaust writer and witness but also an innovative moral thinker in whom his two roles as chemist and writer converged, providing the “matter” of his life. Levi’s writing combined a scientist’s attentiveness to structure and detail, an ironic imagination that found in all nature an ingenuity at once inviting and evasive, and a powerful and passionate moral imagination. Lang’s approach provides a philosophically acute and nuanced analysis of Levi as thinker, witness, writer, and scientific detective.
About Jewish Lives:
Jewish Lives is a prizewinning series of interpretative biography designed to explore the many facets of Jewish identity. Individual volumes illuminate the imprint of Jewish figures upon literature, religion, philosophy, politics, cultural and economic life, and the arts and sciences. Subjects are paired with authors to elicit lively, deeply informed books that explore the range and depth of the Jewish experience from antiquity to the present.
In 2014, the Jewish Book Council named Jewish Lives the winner of its Jewish Book of the Year Award, the first series ever to receive this award.
More praise for Jewish Lives:
"Excellent." –New York Times
"Exemplary." –Wall Street Journal
"Distinguished." –New Yorker
"Superb." –The Guardian
173 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2013
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 21, 2017
This is an interesting insight into Primo Levi, his life and his writing and how various events in his life shaped and influenced these. Lang does assume that you have read most if not all of Levi's work so some parts were lost on me a little bit but those where I had read the relevant books provided some interesting views on the meaning behind his work and how they may have been different had certain events not happened. There is also an interesting chapter on Levi's death and its potential cause, although for me, while this did give an alternative view it felt like pure conjecture and seemed to be there simply to take away the perserved shame of suicide, something which began immediately after his death. An interesting book but you need to have done your research.
January 31, 2014
A neat, short biography of Primo Levi that discusses his ideas and perspectives on writing, Auschwitz, etc. Fair warning: this book assumes you've read Levi and know all the basic trivia.
I enjoyed Lang's observations regarding Levi's idiosyncratic place in world literature, as well as how a shrewd reader might assemble the disparate trains of thought running through his work into a coherent moral philosophy. The only thing I would have requested is more time spent on science, given that science was so important to Levi's personal development, approach to writing, and even physical survival.
I enjoyed Lang's observations regarding Levi's idiosyncratic place in world literature, as well as how a shrewd reader might assemble the disparate trains of thought running through his work into a coherent moral philosophy. The only thing I would have requested is more time spent on science, given that science was so important to Levi's personal development, approach to writing, and even physical survival.
June 3, 2015
Probably deserves more than two stars but I really struggled through this non-traditional biography. It assumed knowledge of the basic facts of Levi's life, as well as his writings but didn't really fill in any blanks in either. Instead it was organized around somewhat subjective themes chosen by the author and how Levi approached each of them. Somehow I felt cheated in each of the chapters that there was not enough of Levi and too much of the author.
August 5, 2016
I actually rate this book 3.5 stars.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews