INTERVIEW BY ZOOM, 12 OCTOBER 2023
SPEAKERS :
Paul-Eric Langevin, memorialist, graduated from Sorbonne Université, grandson of physicists Paul Langevin (1872-1946) and Eliane Montel (1898-1993).
Sophia Kurz, journalist and student in computer science, University of Texas.
Sophia Kurz : Okay so first question, just like really basic. What's your first name? Last name? And what do you do for work?
Paul-Eric Langevin : I'm currently a writer and I do some other things like painting and drawing, and some business. Connected to finance. Well, did I answer?
Sophia : Yeah, that's fine. Um, okay. So first, like real question. From what I gather online, you got a degree in mathematics?
Paul-Eric : I got a degree in mathematics from University Paris VI and a degree in linguistics from University Paris VII. The first was 20 years ago. And, well, I have white hair. And the second was 10 years ago, because I studied linguistics and read a lot about it. Finally, I have a Bachelor of science.
Sophia : Oh, so. And your parents were musicologists.
Paul-Eric : My father, Paul-Gilbert Langevin, was the last son of the physicist Paul Langevin. And from the age of 18, he developped a passion for music, for classical music. He was a teacher in science. And he was a writer in music. So he wrote about classical music for, I think, 35 years.
Sophia : Okay, cool. So, um, you and your sort of immediate family are very kind of into the scientific community, with you studying mathematics. Your father being a musicologist, what sort of inspired this trend of entering the sciences and mathematics?
Paul-Eric : Well, first of all, as far as I'm concerned, for me and my sister, it was a bit different from the other part of the family. Because our father passed away when we were young. So we didn't have close connection to the other part of the family. But I met them again, some years after. So I decided to study science, not only because of the family, but it's a part of it.
Sophia : Of course. What does your sister do?
Paul-Eric : She's a physiotherapist.
Sophia : Oh, cool. Um, so your great-grandfather, Paul
Paul-Eric : Paul was my grandfather, actually.
Sophia : Oh, grandfather, okay.
Paul-Eric : It's a bit special about me. Because when Paul Langevin passed away, my father was 13. And when my father passed away, I was seven. So the difference between the birth of Paul Langevin and my birth is 107 years.
Sophia : Okay, got it. So he was a famous physicist, and you mentioned that your father passed away when you were very young. But did you grow up hearing about your grandfather from your family or in school or anything like that?
Paul-Eric : Yeah. We were talking about him in the family. And I was interested when I was a kid. I was interested in the fact that the name of my grandfather was in the dictionary. So it was and we had a big dictionary, an encyclopedia, in our home, and it was an encyclopedia which belonged to Paul Langevin at that time. So it was quite good. I was a good pupil and a good student. Maybe I can start to give you some dates and some facts. How long do you think we can talk together?
Sophia : However long you need, honestly, I don't have anywhere to eat today.
Paul-Eric : Because I wanted to give you some dates and some names, to understand the context. And I want to tell you that this book was published in French, and the name is « Marie Curie prend un amant », which is in English « Marie Curie gets a lover » or something like that. And I know the author, Irène Frain, the lady who wrote the book, and I want to say that it's a fiction about the affair between Paul Langevin and Marie Curie, but this lady wrote a beautiful book, and I read it. And it was very emotional for me. And I met her some years ago, maybe three years ago. And today, you contacted me, so I phoned her. And I asked her some questions. So this is the name of the writer and the name of the book. If you keep the chat box, maybe you can get the names and the dates.
Sophia : Yeah, I'm taking notes at the same time and I’m writing.
Paul-Eric : First of all, some dates : Pierre Curie was born in 1859. And Marie Curie was born in 1867. And there is another physicist who is important, Jean Perrin, a friend of my grandfather who got the Nobel Prize in 1926, and he was born in 1870. There is another one who was important for this story, the mathematician Emile Borel. My grandfather was born in 1872. And Albert Einstein was born in 1879.
Sophia : And when was Emile Borel born?
Paul-Eric : Oh, sorry, I didn't give the date. It was 1871.
Sophia : Okay.
Paul-Eric : The first important date, the first important moment of this story with the scientists is the creation of the School of Physics and Chemistry in Paris. It was created in 1882. The name of the school in French was « Ecole municipale de physique et de chimie industrielles de la ville de Paris ». Pierre and Marie Curie were working there, and my grandfather was first a student of Pierre Curie, and then a teacher, and then became the director. It was really the place for physics. At the end of the 19th century, and even in the 20th century, it was the place for physics and chemistry in France. It is still an important place now. The name in English is « School of Physics and Chemistry ». So, the name of the director of the school at that time was Paul Schützenberger. Pierre Curie was a teacher in the school. And when Pierre met Marie, Maria Sklodowska, a girl from Warsaw, they got married and Paul Schützenberger proposed to Pierre and Marie to do some research in this place. And the research will finally give the discovery of the Radium and the Polonium in 1898, and they got the Nobel Prize in 1903. So, of course, when I was young, everybody knew about Pierre and Marie Curie working at the end of the 19th century. It was very famous, it was historic for us. So they found the Radium and the Polonium in 1898. And they got the Nobel Prize in 1903. And they went to Stockholm to receive the Nobel Prize. And then, in 1906, something very important happened. Pierre Curie was killed in a car accident, you know, it was a car with a horse.
Sophia : A horse drawn carriage.
Paul-Eric : Two horses maybe. And he was going in the street, and he didn't see the car. And the car killed him instantly. So it was a tragedy for Marie Curie. And then, sorry, I forgot to tell that. Maria Sklodowska was the daughter of a mathematics teacher in Warsaw, Wladislaw Sklodowski. And she had three sisters, Bronia, Helena and Zofia, and one brother, Jozef. And one of the sisters, Bronia Dluska, went to Paris to study medicine. And Maria came to Paris to study physics, and then she met Pierre Curie. And then, they got married and they had two daughters, Irène and Eve. And until 1906, they were a happy couple of researchers. Do you have some questions from all of this? Did you know? Of course you knew, you know some data but you have some questions?
Sophia : Yes. Yeah, I do. Um, so you expressed some scepticism in your emails to me that the affair even happened? Why do you not think it happened? Like what's your side of the story?
Paul-Eric : Okay. So, I will follow the story. In 1906, Pierre Curie died. And maybe, of course, we can imagine that Marie Curie was really, you know, in a deadly feeling after her husband was killed, and she wrote in her books the life of her husband. And then, Paul and her had an affair, because they worked closely, because my grandfather was the student of Pierre Curie and he was supposed to be the new specialist of Pierre Curie’s work. And then, the press from the far right in Paris took the subject and wrote about the affair in the newspapers. And of course, I forgot to tell you about my grandfather's family because he was married. As you know, he was married. He married in 1898 with a young girl, Jeanne Desfosses. And he did a PhD in 1902. He went to Cambridge, and then he got his PhD thesis and then he went back to Paris. Sorry, I will try to explain much clearly, he was a student at the School of Physics and Chemistry, a student of Pierre Curie. And then, he went to the ENS, you know what is the ENS in Paris? The Ecole normale superieure. It is a very important school for very good students. And then he got a scholarship to study in Cambridge. And when he studied in Cambridge, it was with Joseph John Thompson, an English physicist, and Ernest Rutherford, a physicist from New Zealand. And when he finished his scholarship, he went back to Paris to do his PhD thesis in physics. And then he became a teacher. And in 1898, he married a young lady, a young girl named Jeanne Desfosses, and they had four children, two sons, Jean and André, and two daughters, Madeleine and Hélène, my uncles and aunts. But of course, Jeanne is not, if you understood the question, Jeanne is not my grandmother. It was the wife of my grandfather. And, well, I go back to your question. What do I think about what happened? I did not ask my grand mother about the question, because when my grand mother passed away, I was 13. And my father passed away when I was seven. I was a child, so they didn't talk to me about these subjects, of course. Well, I don't know what my father and my grandmother knew about the question.
Sophia : When did you first hear about, like the rumour that this affair happened?
Paul-Eric : When I was young, I was with my grandmother and my parents, we were staying around the School of Physics and Chemistry in the fifth quarter of Paris. But I don’t remember we were going into the school. So I didn't know exactly the place of the school and all the stories about that. But when I was 22 or 23, I visited this school, and I learned a lot of things about all these subjects. And I knew about the question of the affair and the scandal in 1911, of course. I read the book of Irène Frain, and when I finished the book, it was so emotional. So I cried. So, my grandfather was married. He was married to Jeanne. And Jeanne had a sister, Euphrasie Bourgeois, and a stepbrother, Henri Bourgeois. And according to them, Jeanne discovered the story, Jeanne discovered the affair, the link between Marie and Paul. She was really in a bad mood, and she wanted to kill Marie. She took a gun and she wanted to kill her. My grandfather Paul and Jeanne were living in Fontenay-aux-Roses around Paris, and Marie Curie was living in Sceaux, it was not so far. So, the story is that the stepbrother, Henri Bourgeois, published the letters in the press. And then, Jeanne discovered and she got mad, and she wanted to kill Marie, and after the affair, there was a scandal and after the scandal, there was a trial. There was a trial. There has been a trial and there has been duels, duels with guns between the persons who were at the side of Paul Langevin and Marie Curie and the persons who were at the side of the far right journalists. And my grandfather took, what’s the name ? The thing you put on your hand.
Sophia : It's a glove.
Paul-Eric : A glove. Yeah, my grandfather took a glove, because it was usual at that time, he took a glove and he went to the journalist’s place. The name of the journalist was Gustave Tery. He was the journalist who published the scandal. And Paul took a glove. And he put the glove in the face of the journalist. They had a duel in a garden and they were standing the two of them in front. They were standing in front of each other. With the guns. The journalist said that he didn't want to kill this physicist who was very well known. So he didn't use the gun. My grandfather didn't use the gun either. So, the duel was over. But there was a trial between Jeanne and Marie in the court. So, the affair was very important, and Marie was supposed to go to get a second Nobel Prize in 1911. But some said that she should not go to Stockholm, and she should go back to Warsaw, and she should not make noise about her. So it was a time of trouble, because it was very difficult for Paul and it was very difficult for Marie. And there was this mathematician, Emile Borel, who was born in 1871. Her wife was the writer Camille Marbo. They were helping Marie Curie at that time. Because she was in big trouble. She didn't know what to do, going to Stockholm? Not going ? Going back to Warsaw? And there was the trial. Emile Borel and Camille Marbo were very helpful to Marie. So finally, Marie Curie went to Stockholm, and got the second Nobel Prize for herself, only herself. And Paul decided to stay with his wife, Jeanne, and their children. Well, he decided to stay with Jeanne and the children. Do you have questions about that ?
Sophia : Yeah, I have a few follow up questions.
Paul-Eric : I'm sorry. I'm sorry that maybe I don't explain very well in English.
Sophia : No, no, you're doing great. I couldn't explain it in French. So you're doing way better than I could.
Paul-Eric : So the scandal happened. And it was troubled for the scientists and for the families, et cetera. Of course, they were close friends, because Jean Perrin, Paul Langevin, Emile Borel, Pierre and Marie Curie were friends. They were all friends. But Paul and Marie, they actually had an affair, and there is this book by Irène Frain, which is really emotive.
Sophia : So, your grandfather and some journalists in Paris got to a duel, huh? Yeah, I didn't read that anywhere. Like in my research, so I'm just like.
Paul-Eric : There are papers, there are films, there are movies about it. Oh, really? Yeah, really? Sorry. You can ask questions? What do you think about all that?
Sophia : No, I find this all really interesting. But I hadn't heard that there was like a gunfight? Almost. So that's really shocking. Have you ever been in touch with any members of the Curie family?
Paul-Eric : Yeah, yeah, of course. There is another element : another grandson, my cousin Michel Langevin. 50 years after this story, in 1948, he married the granddaughter of Marie Curie, Hélène. So the story has a good end. Last summer, I saw my cousins Noémie, Laurent and Julien. And Hélène and her son Yves. I see them in the summer.
Sophia : That's really cool. So you are close to them.
Paul-Eric : Not so close. But I see them sometimes. Yeah.
Sophia : And so, because it's a link.
Paul-Eric : A link with the family, you know.
Sophia : Right. Yeah. So you mentioned that Jeanne, who was Paul's wife, was not your grandmother.
Paul-Eric : Yeah. The following of the story is that, after 1911, Paul was a teacher, in 1909, he became a teacher in the College de France, you know.
Sophia : Oh, okay. Yes, yes.
Paul-Eric : He became a teacher at the School of Physics and Chemistry and at the College de France, and another school, which is a school for girls, which was very important at that time, the « Ecole normale supérieure de jeunes filles de Sèvres », it was a school for young girls. Maybe for 18 year old girls, who wanted to study science and philosophy. They went to an Ecole normale superieure for girls. There was an Ecole normale supérieure for boys and an Ecole normale supérieure for girls at that time. And my grandfather was a teacher there. So of course, he was a teacher for girls and well, he was a young man and he met my grandmother there. My grandmother was her student. Eliane Montel was the name of my grandmother. She was a student there. And of course, she was not in an affair with him when she was a student, but after that, she remembered very well my grandfather because he had a strong personality. And for three years, maybe, she didn't see him. And then she went to the School of Physics and Chemistry. And she decided to work with him, as a secretary. And they had an affair. They met for the first time around 1920, and then my father, Paul-Gilbert, was born only in 1933. And there was another student, another girl. She was the schoolmate of Eliane : Luce Dubus, and she got married with the second son of Paul Langevin, André Langevin. I give you a lot of things. So it may be difficult, but finally, my father was born in 1933, after Paul Langevin went to China between 1931 and 1932. Do you have other questions? I'm sorry, if I give you a lot of things.
Sophia : This is all great. Like I would not have been able to find this like online or anything like that. So this is really helpful. Thank you. So your grandfather had another affair with Eliane Montel and that's your grandmother?
Paul-Eric : Yeah.
Sophia : And what was Jeanne's reaction to that? If you know it, like his, his wife.
Paul-Eric : He had Jeanne and his children on one side, and he had my grandmother and my father on the other side. Because he was an important man. So it was tolerated. It was accepted. I don't really know everything about it, because, of course everything is not explained, it was not explained in the family, but I think, well, the problem is that Jeanne was his wife. The official wife, and my grandmother was his companion. When my father was born, it was a secret. The other children didn't know about the birth of my father. They knew about him some years after. But your question is, what was Jeanne's reaction? I think it was not so difficult, as the problem was Marie Curie. So maybe, Jeanne accepted. Because my grandmother was not as well known, as important as Marie Curie. But my grandmother was a physicist too. And she did some things. She published some articles in physics and chemistry. But she was not as important as Marie Curie. So it was maybe easier for Jeanne. Well, I didn't ask a lot of questions to the family about this period.
Sophia : What does the rest of your family think about? The affair between Marie and your grandfather?
Paul-Eric : I didn't ask a lot of question, because I know this is a problematic point. When I see them, I don't usually speak about that. For me, it's not so important. Because the figure of Marie Curie is important. The figure of Paul Langevin is important. And I think that the figures are more important, and their work, what they did : science, politics, education. I think it was very important. The scientific role, the educational role. I think we should remember their work. And another part is : there has been a love affair. I think they needed a lot of courage to battle. To do as much work as possible. We should not mix personal life and professional life.
Sophia : I don't really have any more questions. But is there anything else that you want to add about? Just all of it everything? Is there anything else you want to say?
Paul-Eric : I could speak about that for a long time, because I read a lot of things. And I wrote a lot of things too. Did you read the things I sent you?
Sophia : Yeah, I've printed them out and I've started reading it, but it's exam season at my university. So I've just been really busy, computer science, data science, yeah.
Paul-Eric : So, I sent you a little text in English, about the life and family of Paul Langevin. What could I say more ? Ah, there is this book of course, but there is another thing, there is a theatre play, the theatre play which is called « The twin paradox ». Well, the twin paradox is a problem of physics, created by my grandfather at that time. And the theatre play is about the affair and the scandal. I give you the name. The name of the play in French is « Le paradoxe des jumeaux », in English, it's « The twin paradox », and it's a theatre play in French, of course, and the lady who wrote it is Elisabeth Bouchaud.
Sophia : Yeah.
Paul-Eric : I know the person who wrote the theatre play, Elisabeth Bouchaud. She's a physicist and a writer. And she wrote a play about this story. And it's a good play.
Sophia : Um, is there anything else you want to add?
Paul-Eric : Well, I think I spoke about a lot of things. Well, I was a bit troubled when you asked questions about the family, because I don't have all the connections between everybody. I just tried to understand what happened in the 20th century. And because I didn't know my father for a long time, neither my grandmother for a long time, I wanted to know more about the story. And it's interesting, but it's not so easy. My family from my mother’s side, it was easier. It was easier because there were no such famous people.
Sophia : You can talk about your mother if you want.
Paul-Eric : Yeah, my mother, Anne-Marie Desbat, was a physics teacher, too. She was a physics teacher in highschool. And she was a good mother. I don’t know what to say in English.
Sophia : It's great. It's great.
Paul-Eric : Not a so big personality, but she was a very good worker. Very quiet. And there are a lot of good memories. But after that, something happened : she became ill. It was a difficult period. And I think she had a lot of courage at that time. I could write other things about her. She was very interested in litterature. She was a science teacher. But what she prefered was litterature. She worked a lot, and she read a lot of books, a lot of novels and biographies.
Sophia : She sounds like a great woman.
Paul-Eric : But most simple. Not so famous.
Sophia : It still sounds like she was very accomplished.
Paul-Eric : Yeah, you can do a lot of things without becoming famous, and you know, when you're famous, all the problems come to you. You should do what you like to do, and not run after awards or fame. It's crazy.
Sophia : Yeah, I would never want to be famous.
Paul-Eric : All the problems come with.
Sophia : I just want to live my life.
Paul-Eric : But if you write some articles and you write some studies, it's very interesting for the young people.
Sophia : Yeah, well, we'll see I'm still young, so we'll see what happens in my life.
Paul-Eric : Oh, it's okay. We spoke for three quarters of hour. Yeah. Okay. Can I say other things? Yeah. Do you have other questions?
Sophia : Um, honestly, you covered most of what I wanted to know. So if you want to add anything, please, say whatever you would like.
Paul-Eric : Well, maybe 10 minutes more. What can I say? I can say that my sister, Isabelle Langevin, didn't know her father for a long time. She's not really interested in all these stories. But I think her grandfather is important for her, he is important, I think. She has a lot of courage, because she studied medicine, and then she went to the physiotherapy school. She became a physiotherapist, and she likes very much what she does. Of course, she doesn't really like to speak about the past. But maybe she's right, because the past is the past. I think we should know the past, but we should not speak about it all the time. We have to live our lives in the present. But the problem is that when you don't know the past, it’s a problem. I think memories are very important. You should know the memory of your family and the memory of your country. But you should not speak about it all the time. I think she's right, because I was used to think and speak a lot about the past. Now, I try to live much in the present. It's better for us. For young people. Well, I don't know if you understand what I say.
Sophia : Yeah, I think, I mean, like don't focus so much on the past, more the present.
Paul-Eric : Yeah, but you should know it, you should know about it. Because if you don't know about it, it's a problem.
Sophia : In that same perspective, how do you want your grandfather to be remembered?
Paul-Eric : Well, it's a problematic question because of course, he was an important scientist for his time. And he's remembered actually as an important, as a key scientist. But I think he was more than that. In questions of education and questions of activism, political activism. And I think the remembering of his works was not so well down, not so good. I think we should remember him as a scientist, of course, but as well as an educator and an activist. And there is another problem : he was a communist. For some people, it's a problem. For some others, it's not. There is a long story about politics, socialism and communism in France. Some people think that he should have won the Nobel Prize. He was proposed for the Nobel Prize 15 times. And they didn't want to give him the Nobel Prize. Maybe it was because he was a communist. So well, how could he be remembered? I think the scientists of the present will be interested in his work, but it's important to know the work on education and the work on political activism. And this part is not very well remembered. Because in France, the French Communist Party never speaks about him. I don't hear them about the subject. I was very interested in questions of politics before. And now, I'm not really interested anymore. Because it's too much complicated.
Sophia : Yeah, no, I totally get that, you know, I live in the US. So politics are very divided here. And living in the South of America. It's very interesting, because I don't agree with a lot of the politics of this state that I live in, but I live here, so I have to deal with it.
Paul-Eric : To deal with it, yes. I think we can’t change the world. Maybe, we can change what is around us. But not the world. So you have to do your part.
Sophia : Yeah, that's. Yeah, I agree.
Paul-Eric : Where do you stay? Exactly?
Sophia : I go to school in Texas.
Paul-Eric : Texas. And you're in University of Texas. Yeah.
Sophia : Yeah, it's top 50 in the world.
Paul-Eric : Okay. And do the students talk a little bit about politics or nothing?
Sophia : Yes. America is a very political country. People have a lot of opinions about pretty much everything. But in my school especially, it seems like nobody really is indifferent or neutral. Like everybody has an opinion about something. Yeah. Okay. So it's a mess, a little and, you know, I studied journalism, so journalism as an industry is inherently political because we report on politics and politicians so you know, it's um it's hard not to develop your own opinion when it's pretty much all around you.
Paul-Eric : But another question is, well, we could of course speak about politics, because I read and I spoke about politics with my friends a lot. But now, I'm a bit tired about all these subjects. I know there are a lot of troubles nowadays, but it's not as simple, it takes a lot of time to understand, and if you want to act, if you want to do really something, it's very hard to battle. It's very hard to change. Some things can be done. Well, what I say is very general, so I won't say anything else.
Sophia : Um, I think we could probably end the interview here unless you want to add anything, but you have my email address. So if you think anything else you want to talk about, or you want to meet again, for, you know, to add anything. Yeah, please reach out. But yeah, other than that, thank you so much for talking to me. I really appreciate it.
Paul-Eric : I hope what I explained was understandable. Not so complicated. And, of course, I don't know everything about the problematics. But I am a little part of what happened. I was born in 1979. There are a lot of people I didn't meet, but I met a lot of people in France. And I travelled in Europe. Well, maybe we can meet once in France. I don't think I will go to the United States. But why not?
Sophia : I used to live in London when I was 10. Yeah, I lived there for 10 years. My dad works for a French bank, actually, the Credit Agricole.
Paul-Eric : In London?
Sophia : In New York right now, but it's a French bank. Okay, so he would go to Paris a lot for business. And I went to Paris last summer, actually. And yeah, I really enjoyed it.
Paul-Eric : We can meet once.
Sophia : Yeah, I would love to go back to Paris. It's beautiful there.
Paul-Eric : I know well England, and London, and Scotland. And if you have the recording, you will translate it.
Sophia : Yeah, I'll transcribe it.
Paul-Eric : With your computer. Yeah. Okay. And can you send me the recording?
Sophia : Yeah, I'll send you the recording, and I'll send you the transcription when it develops.
Paul-Eric : Okay, thank you very much. If I said some wrong things, I will tell you. Because I'm not able to speak a lot in English. I look for my words, and so on. So maybe if I read once more, I can verify.
Sophia : Oh, you know, if you think of anything that you would explain better in French, you can say it, you can send it to me in French and I can just translate it if that would be easier for you. But yeah, if you think of anything else, please reach out. If I think of anything else, I'll bother you in your email.
Paul-Eric : And there is this book by Irène Frain. And this play by Elisabeth Bouchaud. And of course, there are a lot of books, you don't study science, you study computer science, it’s a bit different. If you were a physicist, I could give you some reference, but well, of course you can look for different books about physics and so on, if you're interested.
Sophia : Yeah, we have a whole building for physics at the University of science, of course. Yeah, yeah, we have a physics library at my university so I'm sure I can find something or talk to a professor. But yeah, I'll let you get back to your evening. I know it's late in France right now. It's like seven.
Paul-Eric : Yeah, okay. I will go to find some tobacco and eat something and so on. But thank you very much for your questions. And if you send me something, I can correct it if there are some problems. And thank you for your interview. And thank you for your time. Yeah. I hope you understood what I explained. Thank you.
Sophia : I can end it's fine.
Paul-Eric : So goodbye. Have a nice time. I want to say to you : good luck and courage for your studies and so on.
Sophia : Thank you. I appreciate it.
Paul-Eric : Good bye.
