Overview

The Nobel laureate Otto Warburg-a cousin of the famous finance Warburgs-was widely regarded in his day as one of the most important biochemists of the twentieth century, a man whose research was integral to humanity's understanding of cancer. He was also among the most despised figures in Nazi Germany. As a Jewish homosexual living openly with his male partner, Warburg represented all that the Third Reich abhorred. Yet Hitler and his top advisors dreaded cancer, and protected Warburg in the hope that he could cure it. In Ravenous, Sam Apple reclaims Otto Warburg as a forgotten, morally compromised genius who pursued cancer single-mindedly even as Europe disintegrated around him. While the vast majority of Jewish scientists fled Germany in the anxious years leading up to World War II, Warburg remained in Berlin, working under the watchful eye of the dictatorship. With the Nazis goose-stepping their way across Europe, systematically rounding up and murdering millions of Jews, Warburg awoke each morning in an elegant, antiques-filled home and rode horses with his partner, Jacob Heiss, before delving into his research at the Kaiser Wilhelm Society. Hitler and other Nazi leaders, Apple shows, were deeply troubled by skyrocketing cancer rates across the Western world, viewing cancer as an existential threat akin to Judaism or homosexuality. Ironically, they viewed Warburg as Germany's best chance of survival. Setting Warburg's work against an absorbing history of cancer science, Apple follows him as he arrives at his central belief that cancer is a problem of metabolism. Though Warburg's metabolic approach to cancer was considered groundbreaking, his work was soon eclipsed in the early postwar era, after the discovery of the structure of DNA set off a search for the genetic origins of cancer. Remarkably, Warburg's theory has undergone a resurgence in our own time, as scientists have begun to investigate the dangers of sugar and the link between obesity and cancer, finding that the way we eat can influence how cancer cells take up nutrients and grow. Rooting his revelations in extensive archival research as well as dozens of interviews with today's leading cancer authorities, Apple demonstrates how Warburg's midcentury work may well hold the secret to why cancer became so common in the modern world and how we can reverse the trend. A tale of scientific discovery, personal peril, and the race to end a disastrous disease, Ravenous would be the stuff of the most inventive fiction were it not, in fact, true.

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9781631493157

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Reviews

A fascinating account of an impossibly arrogant scientific genius, his collision with the monster Adolph Hitler, and the revolutions in cancer research. Sam Apple, a lively stylist, handles these complex, braided narrative threads with clarity, insight, and a nose for the paradoxical and absurd. The result is a genuine contribution to science writing and a model for how to do contemporary nonfiction.--Phillip Lopate While tobacco-induced cancer deaths continue to decline, the second major cause of cancer moves to center stage: obesity. Few realize its profound importance in causing cancer. Sam Apple has written an endlessly interesting and carefully researched book.--Robert A. Weinberg, PhD, Director, MIT Ludwig Center for Molecular Oncology

A fascinating account of an impossibly arrogant scientific genius, his collision with the monster Adolph Hitler, and the revolutions in cancer research. Sam Apple, a lively stylist, handles these complex, braided narrative threads with clarity, insight, and a nose for the paradoxical and absurd. The result is a genuine contribution to science writing and a model for how to do contemporary nonfiction.--Phillip Lopate, Professor of Writing, Columbia University, editor of The Glorious American Essay While tobacco-induced cancer deaths continue to decline, the second major cause of cancer moves to center stage: obesity. Few realize its profound importance in causing cancer. Sam Apple has written an endlessly interesting and carefully researched book.--Robert A. Weinberg, Member, Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research; Professor of Biology, MIT A fantastic read. If you need inspiration for improving your diet and giving up sugar, this is the book for you.--Nina Teicholz, science journalist and bestselling author Ravenous reads like a cancer mystery with the larger-than-life Warburg in the role of the determined detective. By learning of the scientific struggles of the past, you'll gain a new appreciation for the modern focus on hormones, such as insulin, in the development of cancer.--Benjamin Bikman, Associate Professor, Physiology and Developmental Biology, Brigham Young University, author of Why We Get Sick

Author Information

Sam Apple has written for the New York Times Magazine, Wired, the Atlantic, and NewYorker.com. He is on the faculty of the MA in Science Writing and MA in Writing programs at Johns Hopkins.

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