April 22, 2009
Rita Levi Montalcini turns 100
Nobel Prize winning scientist Rita Levi Montalcini turns 100 today.
“At 100, I have a mind that is superior — thanks to experience — than when I was 20,” she told the party, complete with a large cake for her.
The Turin-born Levi Montalcini recounted how the anti-Jewish laws of the 1930s under Benito Mussolini’s Fascist regime forced her to quit university and do research in an improvised laboratory in her bedroom at home.
“Above all, don’t fear difficult moments,” she said. “The best comes from them.”
“I should thank Mussolini for having declared me to be of an inferior race. This led me to the joy of working, not any more unfortunately, in university institutes but in a bedroom,” the scientist said.
I love the photograph of her, by the way.
comments
Leave a Reply
Badass!
Truly a role model for all women who have worked and know the feeling of accomplishment from doing a job successfully.
What an interesting face.