A review by kat2
The Periodic Table by Primo Levi

challenging emotional informative reflective slow-paced

4.75

This book of essays, each named for an element, tells stories of a at Levi’s life as a chemist. Woven through is the story of WWII, from the rise of fascism in Italy through the war’s long after effects. Funny, evocative and memorable. My favorite, “Chromium,” includes an account of how he started writing after the war—from a chaotic outpouring of storytelling to the lucid building of a book that helped him live again. The book’s epigraph is a a Yiddish proverb: Troubles overcome are good to tell. Yes.