Margherita Hack shares memories of Florence in FFF Magazine

by Alexandra M. Korey | Feb 15, 2010 in Science | 1 Comment

Margherita Hack, the renowned astrophysicist who was interviewed in issue #10 Nomadic knowledge shares her memories of Florence, where she spent her first 32 years, in the new magazine FFF (Firenze Fast Forward). Written in Italian and edited by two architects (Gianni Sinni of Social Design Zine and Marco Brizzi of Image), FFF is in its second issue after issue “0″ created positive buzz last summer. Each issue is illustrated by a different artist. Articles are strongly tied to the local scene; in Florence it’s an important contribution to the city’s renewal in the urban and cultural sphere.

That’s why it’s significant that the magazine collects observations on the changed city by Margherita Hack, who has lived away from Florence since she was transfered for work first to Brera and then to Trieste in 1954. In a return visit, she’s amazed by the urban sprawl, the crowds, and the line to get into the Duomo, which she used to use as a shortcut (in through one side door, out through the other!) to get to school. She recalls her first years at the University of Florence, starting in 1940, when girls studying physics were decidedly a minority.

This interview is not about the big world of the stars, but rather the smaller but essential world of one’s city in the context of a magazine that searches for local solutions in an elegant manner. Sometimes it’s good to concentrate on the small things: Hack herself, in her 2004 interview for Illywords,says,

[I encourage] promoting an extensive general knowledge that permits the development of an understanding for what goes on about us and a skill for screening information and sorting out what’s essential. It’s what endows an individual with sufficient mental flexibility to conceive different possible solutions.

The big to understand the small – in the end, that’s a practical approach.

For more information and purchase locations see www.firenzefastforward.it.