Eloge: Edward Rosen, 12 December 1906-28 March 1985Author(s): Edward GrantSource: Isis, Vol. 77, No. 1 (Mar., 1986), pp. 105-106Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of The History of Science SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/232507 .

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NEWS OF THE PROFESSION

Eloge

EDWARD ROSEN, 12 DECEMBER 1906-28 MARCH 1985

Edward Rosen's entire academic life, in- cluding his education, was spent in New York City, the city of his birth. A graduate of the City College of New York in 1926, he received his master's (1929) and doctoral degrees (1939) from Columbia University. When he retired in 1977, Rosen had taught for some fifty years, virtually all of it at the City College of New York and the Gradu- ate Center of the City University of New York, interrupted occasionally by a visit- ing professorship (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1957-1958, and Indiana University, 1963-1964). In recognition of his outstanding research, he was twice named a Guggenheim Fellow (1941-1942, 1945-1946), awarded a National Science Foundation Research Grant (1964-1965), and also appointed Senior Fellow by the National Endowment for the Humanities (1971-1972; 1984-1985). For his splendid Kepler's "Somnium," he won the Pfizer Award of the History of Science Society in 1968. For his many years of outstanding re- search and publication on the life and works of Nicholas Copernicus, he was awarded two major medals: one from the Copernicus Society of America in 1973 and the other, the Gold Order of Merit, from the Polish People's Republic in 1978. In 1983 he was appointed Distinguished Pro- fessor Emeritus at CUNY.

As an undergraduate at the College of the City of New York during 1950-1951, when I first met Edward Rosen, I had occasion to take his two courses on ancient history. My memories of his exceptional teaching tech- nique are still vivid. Although these were lecture courses, Rosen never delivered a lecture. Each class meeting consisted of a series of interrelated questions based on the reading assignment for that day. Since each question was intended for a specific student, Rosen called upon us one after the other sequentially row by row. Students who professed ignorance, or provided erro-

neous or inadequate responses, or tried to bluster through with empty rhetoric, were immediately made aware of their defi- ciencies when Rosen interrupted and posed the same question to the student in the next seat. By the end of each meeting, our an- swers to a series of skillfully formulated questions had produced the equivalent of a lecture in which the basic features of a par- ticular topic had been brilliantly conveyed to the entire class. For most of us, those tWo courses were the most exciting, de- manding, and rewarding of our undergrad- uate careers.

With 11 books, more than 160 articles, and over 90 book reviews, Edward Rosen was obviously a prolific historian of science. The exceptionally high quality of that research, however, entitles him to a place of distinction among historians of science.

As a historian of early modern science, Rosen focused his research efforts on the

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106 NEWS OF THE PROFESSION-ISIS, 77: 1 : 286 (1986)

three giants of the initial phase of the Scien- tific Revolution: Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo. He will be best remembered for two major works: the translation of Kepler's Somnium and Kepler's notes thereon (1967), and his translation of and commentary on Copernicus's De revolu- tionibus (1978). Rosen's superb knowledge of Latin and his tireless efforts to deter- mine the meaning of Latin terms as they were used in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries made him an ideal translator. In- deed those same qualities plus meticulous attention to detail also made him an out- standing commentator.

Over the course of his long research ca- reer, Rosen avoided surveys and broad themes. Almost invariably he chose to re- search and resolve well-defined, highly spe- cific problems, problems that often in- volved widespread misconceptions in the history of science. Typical of his approach were such articles as "The Authentic Title of Copernicus' Major Work" (1943); "The Authenticity of Galileo's Letter to Lan- ducci" (1951); "When Did Galileo Make His First Telescope?" (1951-1952); "The Date of Maurolico's Death" (1956); "Co- pernicus Was Not a Priest" (1959, 1960); "Was Copernicus a Pythagorean?" (1962); "Was Copernicus' Revolutions Approved by the Pope?" (1975); and "When Did Co- pernicus Write the Revolutions?" (1977). (For the titles cited here, see the bibliog- raphy of his works to 1978 in Science and History: Studies in Honor of Edward Rosen, The Polish Academy of Sciences Press, 1978.)

In these and other major and minor pub- lications, Rosen presented his findings with a sense of drama and suspense. With the details of his research in hand, he knew in- stinctively how to organize them into an unfolding story that would retain the reader's interest. Rosen was often the his- torian as sleuth, ever probing and often finding significant evidence in unlikely places. The Naming of the Telescope (1947) is an outstanding example of his approach. At the conclusion of this brief but fasci- nating treatise, Rosen declared: "The his- tory of science is replete with such problems; their progressive solution will throw a clearer light on the development of science, the mighty force that has so pro- foundly affected the life and thought of modern man" (p. 73). Rosen dedicated his life to the resolution of many such problems. He appears to have been con- vinced that the meticulous resolution of precise and well-defined problems would provide the best foundation for the ultimate erection of a more solid superstructure for the history of science. Without a proper foundation, the superstructure would even- tually collapse. Rosen chose to leave the superstructure to others and to concentrate on the foundation. Because of his heroic achievements, that foundation is now stronger and more reliable than ever.

EDWARD GRANT

Department of History and Philosophy of Science

Indiana University Bloomington, Indiana 47405

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