There are a number of European scientists who have received the Lewis Thomas Award for the quality of their scientific writing for the general reader. it is of such a high quality that it is seen to cross 'the divide' into the realm of literature. Challenging the Divide provides information about a number of the recipients of this award since 1993. It was set up by Rockefeller University. The autobiography of Abraham Pais has a place in Challenging the Divide. There will be others as this website is developed.

But, in the twentieth century, most important here are Miroslav Holub and Primo Levi. In the nineteenth century, the life of Sonia Kovalevsky tells the story what a young woman will overcome to fulfil her passionate desire for an education.

Miroslav Holub, The Dimension of the Present Moment and other essays: Essays by Miroslav Holub, edited by David Young, Faber and Faber, London. 1997

Miroslav Holub, Shedding Life: Disease, Politics and Other Human Conditions, translated by David Young, Milkweed Editions.Minneapolis, USA, 1997 [To consider the significance of context of time, space and personal background on approach and conclusion I will be comparing his essay ‘Otters, Beaver and Me’ with Lewis Thomas’s essay ‘Tucson Zoo’.]

Primo Levi, The Periodic Table. Translated from the Italian by Raymond Rosenthal, with an essay on Primo Levi by Philip Roth, Penguin Books, London, 1975

Primo Levi, Tranquil Star: Unpublished stories, translated by Ann Goldstein and Alessandra Bastagli, Penguin Books, London, 2007

Primo Levi, The Wrench, translated from the Italian by William Weaver, an Abacus book, published in Great Britain, 1987.

The biography of Sonia Kovalevsky – 19^th century Russian mathematician, journalist and novelist with a crater named for her on the moon because of her discoveries about the rings of Saturn. Don H. Kennedy, Little Sparrow: A Portrait of Sophia Kovalevsky,  Ohio University Press, Athens, Ohio, London, 1983

Google – Poetry and science in Europe takes the browser to a number of possibilities,

including ‘Poetry for Children: Poetry and Science’.