Primo Levi's first books about his experiences through the Holocaust were autobiographical and subjective; in this, his last book, he tries to take a more analytical approach and the book is written in the style of a philosophy treatise or political study, rather than an empirical account of something that he suffered.
Each chapter of the book is like an individual essay with a beginning, middle and ending. Levi starts by outlining the problems with oral history; each person who lived through something remembers it differently, and so getting a complete and subjective picture from collected memories that might be hazy or fading makes putting a factual account of anything together rather challenging. He goes on to write about the ways in which the Nazis controlled their prisoners, and also asks ethical questions about prisoners who worked for their Nazi captors, sacrificing others to save themselves. Levi wonders if this is a natural human reaction to a situation in which one's life is threatened. The book ends with letters that German citizens have written to Levi, and his replies to each one.
One of the reason's for Levi's prominence as an author of nooks about the Holocaust is his courage in writing down his un-sanitized experiences. He was a prisoner in the infamous death camp Auschwitz, having been transported by train from a Jewish "holding area" in Italy. Levi was imprisoned at the adjunct camp, Monowitz, where Levi and his fellow prisoners were worked until they dropped. What ultimately saved Levi's life was his profession - as a chemist, he could be very useful to the Nazis and he was taken from general physical work duties to work in the laboratories where the Germans were attempting to develop an advanced type of rubber tire. Levi was imprisoned at Auschwitz for just over a year, and was liberated by American forces in 1945.
Levi's most famous work is "The Periodic Table", in which Levi links the qualities of all of the scientific elements. A science book, it was also a New York Times bestseller, and was said by the Royal Institution of Great Britain to be the best science book ever written.
Levi passed away in 1987, after falling from a third floor balcony.
