About the Book
A Financial Times Best History Book of the Year
A Financial Times Summer Reading Favorite
“[V]ividly evokes cultural life in Bohemian Paris, the turbulence of the French Revolution and its aftermath, and the feuds that plagued rival scientists…Levitt’s social history, especially of perfume, is fascinating.” —Wall Street Journal
“A delightful history of science and scent at the dawn of the modern age.” —Financial Times
“Pulling from historical publications and personal writings, Theresa Levitt vividly explains why perfume—bathed in, lathered on, and orally consumed—had a chokehold on Parisian life.” —Scientific American
“[A] fascinating account of the birth pangs of organic chemistry in 19th-century Paris…[Levitt] has caught well these dreaming, competitive, daring men in the act of living, each striving compulsively for the giddy, intoxicating bliss of insight into the making of the world.” —The Times
Until the 1800s, scientists believed that living matter possessed a spirit or essence that differentiated it from nonliving matter. But even as scientific consensus shifted toward the view that all matter shares the same building blocks, some were not convinced.
Elixir tells the story of two dissenters—chemists who redrew the boundary between life and nonlife. In the 1830s, Édouard Laugier and Auguste Laurent worked at Laugier Père et Fils, the oldest perfume house in Paris. By day, they prepared the perfumery’s revitalizing elixirs and rejuvenating eaux. In their spare time, they hunted the vital force underlying life itself. Their ideas, roundly condemned by established chemists, led to the discovery of structural differences between naturally occurring molecules and their synthetic counterparts.
Scientists still can’t explain this anomaly, but it may point to critical insights concerning the origins of life. Rich in sparks and smells, brimming with eccentric characters, experimental audacity, and the romance of the Bohemian salon, Elixir gives a fascinating tour of the alchemical revelations that shaped nineteenth-century Paris—and the modern world.
About the Author :
Theresa Levitt is the Kelly Gene Cook Sr. Professor of History at the University of Mississippi. She is the author of A Short Bright Flash and The Shadow of Enlightenment.
Review :
Almost impossible to put down…Written with the propulsive flow of a novel, [Elixir] unfolds in two interconnected but sequential stories, each following a scientific hero…A whirlwind tour from the point of view of pomades, perfumes, and eau de cologne.
[Elixir] vividly evokes cultural life in Bohemian Paris, the turbulence of the French Revolution and its aftermath, and the feuds that plagued rival scientists…Levitt’s social history, especially of perfume, is fascinating.
A delightful history of science and scent at the dawn of the modern age.
Pulling from historical publications and personal writings, Theresa Levitt vividly explains why perfume—bathed in, lathered on, and orally consumed—had a chokehold on Parisian life.
[A] fascinating account of the birth pangs of organic chemistry in 19th-century Paris…[Levitt] has caught well these dreaming, competitive, daring men in the act of living, each striving compulsively for the giddy, intoxicating bliss of insight into the making of the world.
Focuses on early nineteenth-century bohemian Paris, where the movers and shakers in big-business perfumery battled for advantage against a revolutionary backdrop…The combination of careful research and anecdote in Theresa Levitt’s book makes reading about these entrepreneurs a pleasure.
Comprehensive…Levitt is especially good at evoking the all-consuming nature of scientific rivalry.
[An] extraordinary book, which begins with perfumes and ends by having us think about the origin of life itself. Édouard Laugier would have approved.
A robust package of information written by a historian comfortable inhabiting the past but writing for the present.
If you read this book you will be changed. For those of us who make a living assembling words to describe smells, this book feels like an actual elixir. Absolutely stunning.
Dizzying and fragrant with elegant and riveting sentences, Levitt takes us on a most fascinating journey from the bloody revolutions to the chemistry labs of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century France, all to glimpse the glorious pursuit of scent. Truly a captivating achievement!
‘Here is where the story begins,’ promises Levitt at the end of her prologue, and though it’s only page four, already we’re hooked. Who knew that the history of perfume would incorporate not only alchemy, botany, and fermentation, but intrigue, secrets, and scandal? This thoroughly researched tale is also thoroughly gripping and thoroughly readable. Elixir is a fabulous accomplishment.
Elixir is a fascinating tale of discovery, wonder, and revolution. Beautifully written and deeply researched, it shows how the paths to artificial dyes, bottled soda, and Pasteur’s breakthrough all ran through a humble perfume shop. With remarkable historical and literary skill, Levitt reveals how the quest to supply queenly scents and Napoleon’s bathwater ended up interrogating the most profound questions of life and death.
As Paris was rocked by waves of revolutionary zeal, and lines blurred between cosmetics and medicines, two ambitious young chemists raced to investigate whether there was something special—even unique—about matter that comes from living things. A riveting read!
At a time when the boundaries between scientists, salesmen, and charlatans were as blurry as productive, Levitt describes how investigations about health and hygiene were inseparable from the desire to smell good. The laboratories that gave us modern chemistry were not places where the disturbances of the outside world were kept out, but rather where they were welcomed in to be distilled and repackaged in their most intoxicating form. This highly original work shows us that scientific truth is not only messier than we have previously considered it to be—it is smellier.
