Firsts for Feminism

--------------BOOKREVIEWS--------------=NA11.JRE VOL.309 24 MAY 1984 313 uses to test various ideas about scientific one of the leading mathematicians of communities, natural philosophy and Firsts for Europe and a professor at the University of scientific change. Berlin. Though she was denied admission Cantor takes a sociological approach. feminism to the university, Weierstrass was greatly This is most fruitful in the treatment of the Morris Kline impressed with her ability and took her on surprisingly large number of fluid theorists as a private student. With his backing she that he has uncovered, for they were for the A Convergence of Lives: Sofia received a doctorate in mathematics. most part attempting to use theories of Kovalevskaia, Scientist, Writer, Fortunately, GOsta Mittag-Leffler, a light in Biblical interpretation and were not Revolutionary . liberal Swedishmatheniatician, then engaged in science, by making predictions, By Ann Hibner Koblitz. sponsored her for a professorship at the doing experiments or explicating optical Birkhauser: 1984. Pp.305. $19.95. University of Stockholm, a post she took phenomena. By Cantor's own account, on leaving Berlin and held for many years. they were marginal to the British scientific During these years, and even earlier, she community at the beginning of his period WHY should anyone be interested in a came to know the leading mathematicians of study and irrelevant by its end. biography of someone whose name, much of Europe; it was through recognition in this When Cantor turns to more serious less her work, is known to very few people way, and despite considerable opposition scientific theories, such as the Newtonian and who died nearly one hundred years from the establishment, that she was emission theory, his sociological concepts ago? The chief reason for this fine bio elected to the Russian Imperial Academy are too narrowly conceived. For instance, graphy is that Sofia Kovalevskaia was a of Sciences. he argues that no research occun:ed in the first-class mathematician, who achieved a To those who are primarily concerned emission theory from 1700 to 1740, because place for herself in a period when women with the history of mathematics as such, its proponents were diverted by teaching. were hardly recognized outside the home. this book will be a little disappointing. Besides the simple confusion of a cause and In her time, Kovalevskaia achieved high There is little mention of Kovalevskaia's a correlation, this sort of claim could professional status; she was the first actual work, beyond a list of her publi readily be tested by a comparison with the woman to be awarded a doctorate in cations. But it is clear that whereas some situation on the Continent during that mathematics, the first (outside Italy) to mathematicians make brilliant creations as period. Indeed, Cantor's self-imposed become a professor of mathematics, and youths, Kovalevskaia developed slowly. In restriction to Britain and Ireland is a the first to serve as editor of a major her case the educational difficulties she serious flaw, for a strong case can be made mathematical journal. She also made im faced were at least partly responsible, and that the British Isles were a scientific back pressive contributions to literature, and had she lived longer she would have surely water for most of the period from 1704 to engaged in social and political efforts in the produced much more. Equally interesting 1840, so that what he has given us is cause of women's rights. All of these to historians of the intellectual connections actually an account of a relatively stagnant activities were carried on during a life span in the nirieteenth century are many of the scientific community, rather than a pro of only 41 years (1850-1891) and despite remarks and details concerning the mathe gressive one. Thus, at the beginning of the the inevitable opposition from male pro maticians with whom Kovalevskaia kept nineteenth century, when he declares the fessors in mathematics and other fields. contact. In particular, her relationship emission theory to have been in decay in Kovalevskaia had become attracted to with Weierstrass, who practically adopted England, it was flourishing in France in the mathematics even as a child, when she was her as a daughter, reveals much of that hands of Laplace, Biot and Malus. instructed by tutors. To counter the oppo man's noble character. An explanation for the initial neglect of sition to women as students in the higher Ann Hibner Koblitz quite clearly has Young's contributions - the most Russian academic institutions, she done a great deal of research in Russia and important and original British work in this managed by a rather frequently used Stockholm to write this lucid biography. study - provides, as Cantor recognizes, a subterfuge, called fictitious marriage - The bibliography is immense and will be of critical test of his account. I am, however, legal but not sexual - to get out of the great value to other scholars. Her book only partly persuaded by his solution, country in order to study mathematics. should also be of interest to a broad namely, that the principle of interference Most of the book is devoted to her develop audience, as an example of what a woman was rejected because it was associated with ment, to the lives of her immediate family could accomplish in nineteenth-century Young's unoriginal wave theory. Cantor and friends, and to her troublesome anti-feminist Russia and for the insight into underestimates the quality of Young's relations with her husband, who was a the political and social climate of that work and depends too much on denigrating geologist. Later, she and her "fictitious" period. My only quibble is the word both him - Euler's "English disciple of husband did become sexually involved; the "revolutionary" in the title. Kovalevskaia moderate competence" - and his work, marriage produced a daughter. was indeed what we nowadays know as a which he does not fully and clearly explain. Kovalevskaia's pursuit of mathematics feminist. But she was not a militant. 0 He also introduces an artificial distinction was her main drive in life. After leaving that too sharply differentiates Young's and Russia, she became a student at the Morris Kline is Professor Emeritus at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, all earlier "vibration" theories from University of Heidelberg where she spent New York University. He is author of Fresnel's mathematical "wave" theory, several years. There she learned of the work Mathematical Thought from Ancient to whereas I believe there is a genuine con of Karl Theodore Weierstrass (1815-1897), Modern Times (Oxford University Press, 1972). tinuity from Huygens through Euler and Young to Fresnel. The most valuable feature of Optics after Newton is the vast quantity of primary literature described by Cantor, which can serve as a base for future work on the history of optics, not just British theories oflight. 0 Alan E. Shapiro is Associate ProJessor of History of Science and Technology at the Uni versity of Minnesota. He is the editor of The Optical Papers of Isaac Newton; the first volume, SClence· an dC·lVl 0,0 lzatlOn . In. IIAgncu 0 I ture b y F rancesca B.hL..:ray as recently beeno~ The Optical Lectures 1670-1672, was recently published by Cambridge University Press and will be reviewed in a forthcoming issue of Nature. published by Cambridge University Press. © 1984 Nature Publishing Group.

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