A Dame Full of Vim and Vigour (Women in Science)

A biography of Alice Middleton Boring, a feisty, headstrong biologist who spent much of her adult life teaching in China during some of the most tumultuous times in the country's history. She found herself continually distracted from teaching her students and pursuing her own research by civil war, revolution, the Japanese occupation, World War II, including her internment and repatriation, and the subsequent upheaval which resulted in the creation of a socialist society. Throughout the turmoil, she continued to publish scientific papers, pragmatically changing her research emphasis from cytology and genetics to the taxonomy of Chinese reptiles and amphibians. In spite of her traumatic experiences, she remained deeply influenced by her time in China long after her return to America. Loyalty to the Chinese people and an almost evangelical appreciation of her adopted culture permeated the rest of her personal and professional life.