Pierre Curie to Marie Skladovska

(August 10th 1894)

Nothing could have given me greater pleasure than to get news of you. The prospect of remaining two month without hearing about you had been extremely disagreeable to me: that is to say, your little note was more than welcome. I hope you are laying up a stock of good air and that you will come back to us in October. As for me, I think I shall not go anywhere; I shall stay in the country, where I spend the whole day in front of my open window or in the garden.

We have promised each other - haven"t we ? - to be at least great friends. If you will only not change your mind ! For there are no promises that are binding; such things cannot be ordered at will. It would be a fine thing, just the same, in which I hardly dare believe, to pass our lives near each other, hypnotized by our dreams: your patriotic dream, our humanitarian dream, and our scientific dream.

Of all those dreams the last is, I believe, the only legitimite one. I mean by that we are powerless to change the social order and, even if we were not, we should not know what to do; in taking action, no matter in what direction, we should never be sure of not doing more harm than good, by retarding some inevitable evolution. From the scientific point of view, on the contrary, we may hope to do something; the ground is solider here, and any discovery that we make, however small, will remain acquired knowledge.

See how it works out: it is agreed that we shall be great friends, but if you leave France in a year it would be an altoghether too Platonic friendship, that of two creatures who would never see each other again. Wouldn"t it be better for you to stay with me ? I know that this question angers you, and that you don"t want to speak of it again - and then, too, I feel so thoroughly unworthy of you from every point of view.
I thought of asking your permission to meet you by chance in Freibourg. But you are staying there, unless I am mistaken, only one day, and on that day you will of course belong to your friends, the Kovalskis. Believe me, your very devoted PIERRE CURIE

PS: I should be happy if you would write to me and give me that assurance that you intend to come back in October. If you write direct to Sceaux the letter would get to me quicker.

(Ghazal, my Dear, This is a letter that Pierre Curie wrote to his colleague and later wife Marie Skladovska. I found it in a book that I bought as present for christmas (Love Letter of Great Men and Woman, Macmillan Pan Books 2010). It is such a wonderful language, don"t you think so ? And you see, even the two had a deep friendship in addition to their professional relation, Marie Skladosvka not only got her MSc, but two times (!!!!) the Nobel Price (one for discovery of natural radioactivity).
In the letter above Pierre Curie obviously also tries to convince Marie to stay with him, both for a future scientific career but also in privat, although he knows that this suggestion worries her. You know, Ghazal, what I really would like to know: Did Pierre Curie also promised her that staying with him privatly would not hamper her chances to get the Nobel-Prices, same as I tried to convince you in summer, that spending some time with me wont have any negative effect on your MSc project.
Ghazal, I know you have a good sense of humor, don"t you ?
TAKE CARE, have a nice evening and dreams that make you smile.

Michael





On 20.12.2010 12:17, Ghazal F. wrote:

Hi Michael,
 I read everything, didnt jump over 1 and 2.

Thank you so much for letting me know. I just tried to organize my chaotic thoughts a bid and introduced chapters 1 -3 in the e-mail.

so the link for Ikea was and accident. maybe your dog was looking for attention.

Maybe our dog did it intentionally, because she felt that you ought to see the IKEA book ?

 So you went to Ikea, they didnt have the pizza yet? I think if you buy food or some cake then you can have free tea or coffee right? I heard a story, that the man who owns Ikea. He went to Ikea somewhere (not in sweden) then he wanted the coffee after his food. They wanted money for it. The man was angry and told them who he is and obviously they were ashamed or they didnt know about the free coffee. good that you got the free coffee.

Do you know, if he ever inspected one of the IKEA shops in Munich ? I was quite satisfied there, nothing for me to complain about. But this, in fact, had mainly to do with you guiding me around and making this visit to an exciting language course in Swedish.

I try to answer as soon as I can. dont have bad thoughts. And it is still Ghazal that answers, not an angel from another universe.

 God to hear this, I feel a big relieve. But still think that parts of you are angel like. Maybe thats one of the facettes of your personality that is only visible to other people.

Its christmas soon. What will you and your family do? I will be at home with christmas-tree. will probably get presents. and then at night I will go to a concert with a friend. Its Googoosh, a persian singer. she is very famous since long back. My first time to see her.

I had a look yesterday on some Googoosh videos on youtube. It is very emotionally, but probably requires knowledge of the lyrics. Are there also songs with her on the CD you once gave to me ? But why does she staines her hair blond ?

your view of people not knowing all about themselves. it was interesting. I wonder how other people see me. would be interesting to see yourself from another point of view. i thought about this when i was younger.but you can never really see how other people see you. but interesting.

Yes, you are right. Only very rarely people are honest enough to tell you which picture they have from  you. Whether it is a positive one or a negative, it requires some convidence between two person to speak out. But on a long term, it is useful to find out. I remember, a friend at university ones told me that  " ... I am very unlikely to have real friends.." and others complained that "... I  am always cynical..". I thought that this was result of an misunderstanding, and tried to change my appearance a bid. Never know whether it helps.

take care
/ghazal

Take Care, Ghazal.
Michael