Burr, Chandler 1963-

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BURR, Chandler 1963-

PERSONAL:

Born 1963. Education: Paul H. Nitze School, M.A.; studied at l'Institut d'etudes politiques (Paris, France) and Min Zu Zue Yuen (Beijing, China).

ADDRESSES:

Agent—c/o Author Mail, Random House, 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.

CAREER:

Journalist, author, freelance writer.

WRITINGS:

A Separate Creation: The Search for the Biological Origins of Sexual Orientation, Hyperion (New York, NY), 1996.

The Emperor of Scent: A Story of Obsession, Perfume, and the Last Mystery of the Senses, Random House (New York, NY), 2002.

Contributor to periodicals, including Atlantic Monthly, Fast Company, Fortune, New York Times (magazine), Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times. U.S. News & World Report, contributing editor.

SIDELIGHTS:

Chandler Burr's first book, A Separate Creation: The Search for the Biological Origins of Sexual Orientation was reviewed by Booklist's Ray Olson, who called Burr "that rare bird, the journalist who writes well about science." Olson added that Burr "sends us on a modern odyssey full of intellectual adventure and revelation." In his book Burr reviews the 1991 study by Simon LeVay titled The Sexual Brain, in which LeVay reported differences in brain composition in straight and gay men, as well as the 1993 study by geneticist Dean Hammer of the National Cancer Institute, whose finding that a region of the X chromosome is a factor in homosexuality has led to the debate over the "gay gene."

As Roy Porter explained in the New York Times Book Review, The Sexual Brain "proved hugely controversial. Many scientists resented what they saw as yet more hype from neurologists and geneticists. And homosexual activists of a different politics read it as a kind of suicide note, rather like proverbial Jewish self-hatred. Why volunteer to be a victim?" As Burr shows in A Separate Creation, LeVay has admitted that his results may have been flawed, although he maintains that the fact that they are based on his examination of brains of men who died of AIDS and had been medicated is not an issue.

Washington Post Book World reviewer Richard E. Cytowic wrote that Burr "excels at revealing the media's absurd questions and abysmal grasp of science.… The interests of politics, science, and journalism are at odds. Though 'choice' is a dead scientific issue, Burr notes that a public confused about what a gene even is takes it as a 'symbol of certainty,' of a reality that is too politically terrifying to too many people, a reality they cannot accept without help."

Lawrence Mass, who reviewed A Separate Creation in the Lambda Book Report, wrote that the book is "is basically an update and expansion of [Burr's] … acclaimed overview of contemporary biological studies and perspectives for the Atlantic Monthly in 1993." Mass went on to call the book "a valuable historical document with personal and dramatic moments" and added that Burr "places an emphasis on the value of this research that is compelling: we cannot and should not cease our pursuit of knowledge and understanding of science, solely for fear of the potential for abuse. He's right. We cannot and should not be afraid of the truth." A Publishers Weekly contributor called A Separate Creation a "detailed, elegantly written report."

Burr met Luca Turin, the subject of his book The Emperor of Scent: A Story of Obsession, Perfume, and the Last Mystery of the Senses, while in a Paris train station waiting for the Eurostar to London. He and Turin chatted about the film Mission Impossible, in which Tom Cruise flies a helicopter into the Eurostar tunnel. Turin agreed that it was a good scene, but then explained why it couldn't really be done. When Burr asked Turin what kind of work he did, the biophysicist told him that he worked with "smell." Fascinated with Turin and his theories, Burr was soon at work on a new book.

Turin, a scientist and olfactory genius able to analyze smells since early childhood, began his perfume collection at a young age. In 1992, he published Perfume: The Guide, which led to his discovery by the industry giants who create the name-brand fragrances. Turin soon realized that neither they, nor the scientists, chemists, or biologists really understood how the sense of smell works. His own theory, which Burr feels is worthy of the Nobel Prize, is discussed in the book.

Each of the seven largest perfume manufacturers creates between 500 and 2,000 scent molecules each year, and the approximately twenty that pass muster are then tested for toxicology at a cost of approximately $250,000 each. Occasionally, one will be good enough to market. The belief among these scientists and manufacturers is that scent is based on molecular shape. Turin, who examined a 1938 theory of Malcolm Dyson, feels he is correct in stating that scent is based on molecular vibration.

The Emperor of Scent is a biography about a man and his science. David Walton remarked in a review for Startribune.com that Turin "is an engaging character, bawdy and outspoken and highly opinionated, straight in a realm of expertise inhabited largely by gay men. What gives his story drama is his resistance to inbred, conventional wisdom. Many prestigious careers and many million in research funds were vested in the idea that scent originated in molecular shape. Turin's theory was likely to win him few friends and many powerful opponents."

As Burr explains in The Emperor of Scent, Turin, a multidisciplinary scientist who draws on chemistry, physics, and biology, has few peers who have any understanding of his work. The magazine Nature held his paper for more than a year before rejecting it. Burr writes that "the biologists said the chemistry was wrong, the chemists said the problem was the physics, and the physicists said the fault lay with the biology." Liesl Schillinger wrote in the New York Times Book Review that Burr "sought out highly placed academics and researchers, asking them to identify the crack's in Turin's theory—and to defend their own. To his astonishment, he writes, they were not only uncooperative, they were hostile."

James Vaughn, reviewing The Emperor of Scent for Human Nature Review Online, commented that Burr "tells this story well; it is an excellent representation of how science works, and how it sometimes doesn't work." New York Times critic Janet Maslin concluded her review by saying that the book "presents a larger-than-life autocrat and his interesting, engaging eccentricities. Others may wake up and smell the coffee, but he may declare, 'Wow, lots of pyrazine' while doing so."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, May 1, 1996, Ray Olson, review of A Separate Creation: The Search for the Biological Origins of Sexual Orientation, p. 1466; December 1, 2002, Donna Seaman, review of The Emperor of Scent: A Story of Obsession, Perfume, and the Last Mystery of the Senses, p. 635.

Economist, January 25, 2003, review of The Emperor of Scent.

Kirkus Reviews, November 15, 2002, review of The Emperor of Scent, p. 1667.

Lambda Book Report, July, 1996, Lawrence Mass, review of A Separate Creation, p. 14.

New York Times, February 13, 2003, Janet Maslin, review of The Emperor of Scent.

New York Times Book Review, August 11, 1996, Roy Porter, review of A Separate Creation, p. 8; February 23, 2003, Liesl Schillinger, review of The Emperor of Scent, p. 23.

Publishers Weekly, May 13, 1996, review of A Separate Creation, p. 65; December 2, 2002, review of The Emperor of Scent, p. 47.

Washington Post Book World, September 1, 1996, Richard E. Cytowic, review of A Separate Creation, p. 9.

Women's Wear Daily, January 16, 2003, Jessica Kerwin, review of The Emperor of Scent, p. 6.