Aleksandr Porfir’evich Borodin: A Chemist’s Biography

182 Pages·1988·4.09 MB·English

by  N. A. Figurovskii

Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin
Portrait by E[lena] T[imofeevna] Makovskaia (1870)
(The original is to be found in the Glinka State Central Museum of Musical Culture, Moscow. - T.)
N. A. FigurovskiI and Yu. I. Solov'ev
Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin
A Chemist's Biography
Translated from the Russian
by Charlene Steinberg and George B. Kauffman
Foreword by Martin D. Kamen
Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg New York
London Paris Tokyo
Translators:
Charlene Steinberg
Department of Chemistry
University of Wisconsin Center-Sheboygan
Sheboygan, WI 53081, USA
George B. Kauffman
Department of Chemistry
School of Natural Sciences
California State University Fresno
Fresno, CA 93740, USA
Author o/Foreword:
Martin D. Kamen
Professor Emeritus of Chemistry
University of California, San Diego
La Jolla, CA 92093, USA
ISBN-13:978-3-642-72734-4 e-ISBN-13:978-3-642-72732-0
DOl: 10.1007/978-3-642-72732-0
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data.
Figurovskii, Nikolai Aleksandrovich. Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin.
Translation of: Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
\. Borodin, Aleksandr Porfir'evich, 1833--1887. 2. Chemists-Soviet Union-Biography.
I. Solov'ev, Wrii Ivanovich. II. Title.
QD22.B72F513 1988 540'.92'4 [BI 87-23433 ISBN-!3:978-3-642-72734-4 (U.S.)
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© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 1988
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1988
The use of registered names, trademarks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific
statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for
general use.
2152/3020-543210
This book is dedicated to the cause
of friendship between two great peoples,
those of the
United States of America
and those of the
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin
by N. A. Figurovskii and Yu. I. Solov'ev
Excerpts from reviews of the Russian Edition (1950)
" ... completely reveals the charming aspect of a brilliant representative of Russian
culture in a lively, popular form ...
· .. provides great interest for broad circles of Soviet readers ...
· .. Borodin's letters to chemists and letters from other scientists received by him,
which are [here] published for the first time, are of great interest. Borodin's
complete letter to A. M. Butlerov is published for the first time. The author
[Borodin] writes with bitterness about the difficulties in building a new laboratory
at the Military-Medical Academy and about the absurd organization of work,
which hampered fruitful scientific and pedagogical activity ...
· .. Borodin's life is depicted against a background of the cultural life of Russia."
- O. A. Starosel'skaia-Nikitina: Sovetskaia Kniga. 3: 81 (1951)
" ... fully elucidates for the first time the scientific activity of [this] outstanding
. Russian chemist, establishing the contemporary significance of his works ...
a valuable essay on the history of Russian science written in a popular and
fascinating manner. The authors make the most of the works of Borodin and his
students, the large collection of archival materials, and the epistolary legacy of
the last century. It is the first monograph which acquaints the reader with all
sides of the life and versatile activities of [this] outstanding Russian scholar
patriot and great composer."
V. V. Razumovskii: Priroda. 3: 87,88 (1951)
Foreword
A full century has passed since the sudden and tragically premature demise of
Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin in 1887 at the age of 53, when he was following
with phenomenal success the disparate careers of musician, composer, organic
chemist, and pioneer in women's medical education. As a unique figure among the
remarkable group of geniuses who suddenly appeared in Russia in the middle of the
last century and explosively propelled that country into the mainstream of world
culture in the arts, humanities, and sciences, it might have been expected that
Borodin was the object of much research. However, he remains a victim of an
affliction on-going in the biographical arts - the Missing Image Syndrome, as I have
had the presumption to term it. In the production of a color photograph the
conventional procedure requires the preparation of three images as seen through
three primary colors. These are superimposed to give a photograph or projection
which shows the original object faithfully rendered in full color. The loss of anyone
of these partial color images results in a distorted color rendition. The analogy to the
situation confronting the reader supplied with an essentially one-sided biography is
clear. For example, there are few who would be satisfied with a biography of
Leonardo da Vinci written wholly from the aspect of his interest and achievements in
aeronautical science.
In the Western world - and even in Russia - the predominant documentation
of Borodin's activities has been concerned with his musical genius. There is no doubt
that he was one of the supremely talented melodists in musical history, and a
testimonial to this gift is readily at hand in the popularity of the many exotic
themes that he bequeathed in his compositions, adapted by Robert Wright and
George Forrest for their musical comedy Kismet. But, in accord with the syndrome
mentioned above, his images as a chemist and educator are missing. That of the
chemist was rescued from oblivion only recently in Russia, with the appearance
of the first and only book-length biography on record dealing mainly with Borodin
as a great pioneer of Russian organic chemistry. However, as its authors -
Professors N. A. Figurovskii and Yu. I. Solov'ev - explicitly state, this memoir was
projected as one in a series of short monographs intended for popular consumption.
Still. it went some distance in closing the yawning gaps in the biographical treatment
of Borodin's life and accomplishments.
There is no doubt that the Russian contribution to the amazing development
of structural chemistry in the last century has tended to be underplayed, while
that in the rest of Europe has received much more attention. One wonders, in
particular, whether Borodin's name might not have appeared in the chemical
pantheon, as have those of Mendeleev, Markovnikov, Menshutkin, and many other
X Foreword
Russians, if the aldol condensation, which he was the first to discover and
investigate, had been named the Borodin condensation. Straightening out the
record is important; Figurovskii and Solov'ev's biography does much in this
respect. Just as meritorious have been the scholarly and exhaustive efforts of
Professors Charlene Steinberg and George B. Kauffman, who have made the
Russian text accessible to the Western world in their accurate and engrossing
translation. Their task was complicated not only by the well-known difficulties
in producing an English text completely faithful in spirit as well as detail to
the Russian version but also by the somewhat strident propagandist overtones
which to some extent have weakened the generally favorable impression of the case
that the Russian authors were making to uphold the priority of Borodin's
researches in various areas of aldehyde chemistry. The final version now offered
to the reader seems eminently adapted to permit accurate evaluation of the
merits of the Russian text.
What emerges is a document which for the first time enables the chemist
and also the intelligent lay reader outside Russia to appreciate the remarkable
contributions to organic chemistry as well as to women's medical education
made by Borodin, despite infuriating distractions, his natural inability to say
"no", and by pathetic inadequacies in facilities and instrumentation. What can
also be seen is the scope of the many questions remaining to be answered.
It is clear that a treatment in depth of the Borodin corpus of chemical research
is still to be done. For the psychohistorian there is the need to probe Borodin's
complex interactions with his friends and particularly with his remarkable mother
and neurasthenic wife. One receives a strong impression that Borodin accomplished
as much as he did, despite his natural indolence, because of the dedication of his
mother, who kept him focused on achievement rather than on nondirectional
activity.
But this is not the occasion to indulge in speculations as to what pro
fessionals in the area of cultural history and biography will find when they
start mining the resource materials which hopefully still exist. One can only wish
that the present translation will arouse attention among a wider audience than its
original Russian version so that eventually there will be available biographies which
show Borodin in all his images and in full color.
Montecito, May 1988 Martin D. Kamen
Dr. Kamen, codiscoverer of carbon-14, the critical long-lived isotope that revolutionized the medical
and biological sciences through its use as a tracer, was a central figure in the pioneering
nuclear research performed at the Radiation Laboratory of the University of California, Berkeley.
He attained international recognition for his work on bacterial photosynthesis, bacterial cytochromes,
and the use of radioisotopic tracers in biological and biomedical research. He was born in Toronto
to Russian immigrant parents; like Borodin, he is an accomplished musician, who plays chamber
music and symphonic music. His latest book is Radiant Science, Dark Politics: A Memoir of the
Nuclear Age (University of California Press, 1985).
Translators' Preface
The centenary of Borodin's death [he died on February 15 (Old Style), February 27
(New Style), 1887] provided the impetus for our translation of the Russian monograph
Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin,l written as part of the Academy of Sciences of
the USSR's Nauchno-populiarnaia seriia (Popular Scientific Series) by two
distinguished Russian historians of chemistry, Professors Nikolai Aleksandrovich
Figurovskii and Yurii Ivanovich Solov'ev of the Academy's Institute for the
History of Science and Technology. This 212-page book, published 38 years ago
but hitherto inaccessible to chemists, historians of science, and music lovers who
do not read Russian, filled a gap in the literature by dealing with both Borodin's
chemical and scientific work as a whole in the milieu of nineteenth-century Russian
life. Since English has become a virtual lingua franca in the course of the last few
decades, we hope that the fruit of our effort will provide a source of information on
Borodin for an international audience.
Cognizant of the Italian warning "traduttori traditori" (translators are traitors),
we have adhered as closely as possible to the original text, but we have not
hesitated to change words here and there, to condense repetitive or circumlocutious
expressions, or to recast unusually awkward constructions into idiomatic English.
Our goal has been to preserve the spirit rather than the letter of the text, and
we hope that the result will approximate a book written by the authors as if
English were their native language rather than a translation.
We have also introduced a number of features that should make the volume
more useful and convenient for Western readers, e.g., translators' footnotes
(designated "T." to avoid confusion with the authors' footnotes, designated "A.")
for unfamiliar terms; the use of first names and patronymics the first time that a proper
name appears and then usually omission of initials thereafter; names of publishers
when available for references cited; an index of Borodin's musical compositions;
name and subject indexes; and a selected bibliography. In many cases we have
included transliterated Russian terms, followed by English equivalents in parentheses.
Material added by the translators is usually enclosed in brackets.
I H. A. <l>HrYPoBcKHH H 10. 11. COJIOB'beB: AneKcaHLlp I1opqmp'beBHQ I)0POLlHH.
113L1aTeJIbCTBO AKaLleMHH HaYK CCCP, MocKBa-JIeHHHrpaLl, 1950;
N. A. Figurovskii i Yu. I. Solov'ev: Aleksandr Porfir'evich Borodin. Izdatel'stvo Akademii Nauk
SSSR (Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR), Moscow-Leningrad, 1950.
XII Translators' Preface
There are numerous conventions concerning the transliteration of Cyrillic
characters. We have consistently employed the Library of Congress System 112
except for proper nouns which have a conventional English spelling, e.g., Czar not
Tsar, Beilstein not Bell'shtein, Goldstein not Gol'dshtein, Herzen not Gertsen,
Mariinsky not Mariinskii, Mussorgsky not Musorgskii, Prince Igor not Prince Igor',
Rimsky-Korsakov not Rimskii-Korsakov, Stassov not Stasov, Tchaikovsky not
Chaikovskii, Tolstoy not Tolstoi, etc. We have also rendered 10 and R at the beginning
of a word as Yu and Va, respectively, rather than lu and la.
Since the USSR did not adopt the Gregorian calendar (New Style - N.S.)
until February 1, 1918, Russian dates (Julian calendar or Old Style - O.S.) at
the time of the events taking place in this book were 12 days behind those in
other European countries. In this book the reformed calendar (N.S.) is used for
events occurring outside Russia, while the unreformed calendar (O.S.) is used for
events inside Russia. In cases of possible ambiguity both forms are given.
We are indebted to Professor Yurii Ivanovich Solov'ev, Institute for the History
of Science and Technology, Academy of Sciences of the USSR, Moscow; Professor
Ian D. Rae, Department of Chemistry, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria, Austra
lia; Professor Emeritus Martin D. Kamen, Department of Chemistry, University of
California, San Diego, La Jolla, California; and Professors Richard P. Ciula and
Ronald L. Marhenke, California State University, Fresno; for critical readings of the
manuscript. Of course, we are solely responsible for any distortions or errors that
we may have unwittingly introduced in the course of our translation. We also wish to
thank Sharon Turner and Mary McIntyre for typing the manuscript while
simultaneously coping with the idiosyncrasies of new word processors. We are
indebted to Robert Michelotti for reproducing the photographs in this volume.
Furthermore, we gratefully acknowledge the assistance of the following librarians of
the Henry Miller Madden Library of California State University, Fresno - A. Zane
Clark, Thomas J. Ebert, Herbert S. Fox, William H. Heinlen, Diane L. Majors,
Paul M. Priebe, and Jeanne M. Tempesta.
Last but not least, one of us (GBK) wishes to thank the California State
University, Fresno, for a sabbatical leave of absence.
Charlene Steinberg George B. Kauffman
2 Joseph Thomas Shaw: The Transliteration of Modern Russian for English-Language Publications.
University of Wisconsin Press, Madison, WI, 1967, p. 8.