BULLETIN FOR THE HISTORY OF CHEMISTRY
Volume 50, 2025
Ramberg, Peter J., “Review of Emil Fischer's “From My Life” by Emil Fischer, translated by David M. Behrman and Edward J. Behrman,” Bull. Hist. Chem., 2025, 50, 66-67.
https://doi.org/10.70359/bhc2025v050p066
Abstract/Description: Emil Fischer (1852-1919) is one of the most famous chemists of the nineteenth century, best known for his
work on the configuration of the isomers of glucose, and the structure of proteins. Appointed as successor of August Hofmann at the University of Berlin in 1892, Fischer was among the most prestigious chemists in Germany at the turn of the twentieth century, and in 1902 won the second Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his work on purines and carbohydrates. Fortunately for historians, Fischer left two autobiographical works. The first is an elevenpage recollection of his time as a student in Adolph von Baeyer's laboratory in Strasbourg. The second is a monograph, Aus meinem Leben, written in the “disastrous year” (Unglücksjahre) of 1918, that Fischer was unable to complete before his death in 1919. The manuscript was published in 1922 in the multi-volume set of Fischer's collected works. These two sources, together with the nearly 500-page 1921 biography by Fischer's student Kurt Hoesch, are still the major accounts of Fischer's life. Aus meinem Leben was reprinted in German in 1987, with a forward and afterword in English by the organic chemist Bernhard Witkop (1917-2010). Until now, none of these three works has been translated into English, so a translation of Aus meinem Leben into English is welcome for those historians who are unable to read the original.