Primo Levi’s lesson: A bridge between chemistry and literature

by Luigi Dei, University of Florence, Italy
All rights reserved Copyright 2011 Luigi Dei.

Luigi Dei: Associate Professor of physical chemistry at the Chemistry Department “Ugo Schiff” and Faculty of Sciences, University of Florence. Member of the Board of Trustees of the same University and Director of the Florence University Centre for Cultural Heritage. Author of more than 150 scientific publications on nanomaterials chemistry and nanotechnology applied to cultural heritage conservation. Author of popularisation of science works, as the translation into Italian and editing of the book “Michael Faraday and the Royal Institution. The genius of man and place” by Sir John Meurig Thomas (Michael Faraday: la storia romantica di un genio”, Firenze University Press 2007), the editing of the book “Voci dal mondo per Primo Levi. In memoria, per la memoria”, Firenze University Press, 2007. His conference “Primo Levi’s Lesson: a Bridge between Chemistry and Literature” has been given in several universities in Italy and other countries and the Italian Society of Chemistry in 2010 edited a DVD of the lecture both in Italian and English. In 2010 he participated to the International Festival of Science in Genua with the lecture “Science tells Ravel’s Bolero”. In 2011 he wrote a scientific-civil drama from his Levi’s conference entitled “Author’s molecules (in search of memory)” waiting for the first playing.