Member-only story
The 103-years-old Nobel Laureate Who Rocked Italy And The US
Being a woman and a Jew in Fascist Italy did not stop Rita Levi-Montalcini
Clear blue-green eyes, silver hair immaculately coiffed in a Gibson-girl-esque updo and a bird-like, deceptively frail figure dressed in high-neck, puff-sleeved Victorian-inspired dresses: that was Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909–2012), the most recognizable member of the Italian senate. When she turned 103 she was partially blind, almost completely deaf, and had difficulty with walking — but she had lost none of the intensity and acumen that were her trademark.
“My mind had never been as active as it is now,” she said, “The body does whatever it wants. I am not my body; I am my mind.”
A Remarkable Family
Rita Levi-Montalcini’s family was not your ordinary turn-of-the-century household. Her mother, Adele Montalcini, was a talented painter, and Adamo Levi, her father, was an electrical engineer and mathematician. Rita’s twin sister, Paola, became a well-known painter, and her brother, Gino Levi-Montalcini, a famous architect and designer. The Levi-Montalcinis lived in Turin and were of Sephardic Jewish origin, and that would later play a key role in their life.
