2000, ISBN: 9781559705370

Arcade Publishing. Very Good. 6.25 x 1.5 x 9.25 inches. Hardcover. 2000. 489 pages.dj chipped<br>A lively history of the world's most pres tigious award traces the history of th… Mehr…

Arcade Publishing. Very Good. 6.25 x 1.5 x 9.25 inches. Hardcover. 2000. 489 pages.dj chipped<br>A lively history of the world's most pres tigious award traces the history of the Nobel Prize, explaining h ow it originated, how it works, and how it is influenced by outsi de pressures and discussing the six fields in which it is awarded --literature, physics, chemistry, medicine, peace, and economics- -and its laureates. 15,000 first printing. Editorial Reviews Fr om Publishers Weekly If you had been awakened by an early-morning phone call this October to learn that you had just been awarded a Nobel Prize, you would have won a little under one million doll ars and worldwide fame. However, if your sleep was undisturbed, y ou are in the company of Marcel Proust, Jonas Salk, Edwin Hubble, Joan Robinson, Mahatma GandhiAto name only a few world-renowned figures listed by Feldman who weren't awarded a prize. Feldman, w ho holds a Ph.D. in the history of science and ideas, surveys the history of the six illustrious prizes, which all sprang from a v ague paragraph in dynamite king Alfred Nobel's will. The proceedi ngs of the Swedish and Norwegian institutions that award the priz es are kept sealed, but Feldman, who uses earlier accounts contai ning leaks and interviews, analyzes the choices since 1901 to sho w the jostling for favorite candidates that occurs, and how prize s are often awarded to make a political statement, especially tho se for literature and peace. Feldman relies almost exclusively on secondary literature; his reluctance to interview living prize w inners makes his otherwise carefully considered study less than d efinitive. The structure is occasionally flabby and the chapters on the science prizes are slightly technical, but the reader who isn't a science buff will get a valuable short course in the hist ory of 20th-century science and medicine. 8 pages of illus. not s een by PW. (Dec.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Booklist Feldman relates the lively history of the most pr estigious merit awards in consistently engaging fashion, touring its century-long existence forward from the will of dynamite mogu l Alfred Nobel. That tersely phrased testament contains some quir ky commandments, such as that the prizes be conferred on work don e in the year immediately preceding. Further, Nobel stipulated am biguous criteria for each prize, which kindled controversy, espec ially in regard to the peace and literature prizes; the latter, f or instance, supposedly goes to work of an idealistic tendency. T urning to the track records of the physics, chemistry, and medici ne awards, Feldman chronicles the evolving preferences of the Swe dish awarding committees (e.g., their favoring of particle physic s over astrophysics) and their quirks, exemplified by the truly b izarre awarding of the prize in medicine to the inventor of the l obotomy. In pointing out such mistakes, the mediocrities who got prizes, and the worthies--Emile Zola, Edwin Hubble, the Mahatma G andhi, etc.--who didn't, Feldman reveals the human side of the No bels. Gilbert Taylor Copyright © American Library Association. Al l rights reserved About the Author Burton Feldman earned his Ph. D. in the history of ideas and science at the University of Chica go. He has taught at the universities of Chicago, Maryland, Denve r, and Colorado at Boulder, and at Hebrew University in Jerusalem . He has written on religion and myth, literary criticism, and po litics. ., Arcade Publishing, 2000, 2.75<

2000, ISBN: 155970537X

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