2012 Philadelphia Book Festival
Award-winning science writer Dava Sobel’s bestselling books include Longitude, Galileo’s Daughter, and The Planets. In the elegant Longitude, Sobel relayed the dramatic human story behind the invention of the chronometer, which revolutionized naval navigation. With Galileo’s Daughter she infused the father of modern science with expressions of character and everyday details, bringing his enveloping struggle to life. A freelance writer for twenty years, Sobel was a staff reporter in the Science News department at the New York Times. She is also the co-author of The Illustrated Longitude and the editor of Letters to Father. A More Perfect Heaven merges her Copernicus-inspired play, And the Sun Stood Still, with the nonfiction narrative of Copernicus’s life, seminal text, and revolutionary ideas. (recorded 4/21/2012)