Hall, Stephen S. 1951–

PERSONAL:

Born October 28, 1951, in Cleveland, OH; son of Robert S. (in business) and Delores (a college administrator) Hall. Education: Beloit College, B.A. (with honors), 1973.

ADDRESSES:

Agent—Melanie Jackson Agency, 250 W. 57th St., Ste. 1119, New York, NY 10107.

CAREER:

Washington Post, Washington, DC, from national desk news assistant to sports reporter, 1973-75; San Francisco Chronicle, San Francisco, CA, general assignment reporter, 1978-79. Freelance writer in Rome, Italy, 1975-77, and New York, NY, 1980—.

MEMBER:

PEN American Center.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Lowell Thomas Award, Society of American Travel Writers, 1988; Los Angeles Times Book Award nomination, 2003, for Merchants of Immortality: Chasing the Dream of Human Life Extension.

WRITINGS:

Invisible Frontiers: The Race to Synthesize a Human Gene, Atlantic Monthly Press (New York, NY), 1987.

Mapping the Next Millennium: The Discovery of New Geographies, Random House (New York, NY), 1992.

A Commotion in the Blood: Life, Death, and the Immune System, Holt (New York, NY), 1997.

Merchants of Immortality: Chasing the Dream of Human Life Extension, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 2003.

Size Matters: How Height Affects the Health, Happiness, and Success of Boys—and the Men They Become, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 2006.

Contributor of chapters to Newton at the Bat, Scribner, 1983; Italian Americans: New Perspectives in Italian Immigration and Ethnicity, Center for Migration Studies, 1984; and The Armchair Book of Baseball II, Scribner, 1987. Contributing editor to Science '86, 1983-86, and Hippocrates, 1986—.

SIDELIGHTS:

Stephen S. Hall writes on scientific matters in a clear and imaginative style, according to critics. His accounts of biological research in Invisible Frontiers: The Race to Synthesize a Human Gene and computer cartography in Mapping the Next Millennium: The Discoveries of New Geographies are intended for general readers and have been praised by reviewers for their accessibility to the non-scientist. Edward Yoxen commented in the Times Literary Supplement that "Invisible Frontiers is written as a popular book—there are no footnotes, no references to scholarly literature in the history of science—but it is very far from being superficial. It represents a significant achievement, in gathering and interpreting data."

In describing the competition among three teams of scientists to synthesize the human insulin gene in Invisible Frontiers, Hall reveals the extent to which research biology has become a huge commercial venture. The ultimate goal of the scientific teams was to be the first to genetically engineer the production of human insulin. Genentech, a private engineering firm which sponsored the group of scientists that proved most successful with the task, went on to realize substantial profits from the project. Basing his work on more than one hundred interviews, Hall did not avoid the delicate issues that surrounded the enterprise. "This, then, is very much more than a classic story of scientific discovery," Yoxen remarked, pointing out such sensitive areas covered in Invisible Frontiers as the effects of industry on an "already highly competitive research culture" and the intense political debates over the safety of recombinant DNA research, in which genetic material from one organism is transferred to another. The book depicts the resentment on the part of scientists over regulatory interference by municipal and federal authorities, as well the frustration felt by junior team members, who often did not receive credit for their contributions to the endeavor. Writing for the New York Times Book Review, Daniel J. Kevles summarized Invisible Frontiers as "an illuminating rendition of the technical and the entrepreneurial beginnings of Genentech, now one of the country's leading biotechnology companies, and, by extension, of the birth of the biotechnology industry from the academic womb of molecular biology."

In his second book, Mapping the Next Millennium, Hall reveals how scientific researchers in many fields use forms of map-making to arrive at new discoveries. "Hall finds counterparts to intrepid explorers such as Columbus and Magellan not in today's financially embattled geography departments but among the scientists and mathematicians who are using computer graphics to represent and analyze the frontiers of knowledge," reported Edward Tenner in the Los Angeles Times Book Review. Full-color illustrations, such as the image of a guinea-pig brain produced by photographing radiation that was introduced into the tissue, accompany Hall's essays on the modern cartographers who chart virtually unseen territory with computers and satellites. James Trefil, writing for the New York Times Book Review, found most of Hall's essays full of historical detail, but he noticed certain "distortions." Trefil wrote: "In a chapter devoted to the DNA molecule, for example, he gives wonderful explanations of early genetic work on fruit flies and the development of gene splicing in the 1970s, but then devotes less than a page to the Human Genome Project, which is surely one of the great mapping enterprises of our era." Researchers involved with the Human Genome Project, a contemporary endeavor to catalog the genetic code for every human gene, use a mapping technique to determine where certain traits occur. Tenner expressed some reservations about Hall's presentation of history, suggesting that the book would have benefited from a more comprehensive look at the people who have helped science develop in a cartographic fashion—most notably such nineteenth-century figures as Lambert-Adolphe Quetelet and Etienne-Jules Marey. Despite such misgivings, Tenner acknowledged the author's eloquence: "Throughout Mapping, Hall sustains a string of vivid, concise, often witty metaphors that make him one of the best scientific explainers at work."

A Commotion in the Blood: Life, Death, and the Immune System tackles the complicated and potentially confusing history of research into immune therapy treatment for cancer over the past hundred-odd years. Dr. Robert S. Schwartz stated in a New England Journal of Medicine review: "Hall's absorbing, often gripping account of the development of immunotherapy begins with the story of William B. Coley, the inventor of Coley's toxin (a crude mixture of supernatants from bacterial cultures). Coley stumbled on his toxin around 1890 in his search for a factor in hemolytic streptococci that he thought caused regressions, and even cures, of inoperable sarcomas. Helped by the Rockefeller family, Coley produced spectacular results. Others, however, could not reproduce them." Sadly, as a result, Coley ended his career scorned by his medical peers. Jerome E. Groopman wrote in the Wall Street Journal: "Mr. Hall charts the forces that sweep cancer immunology along in waves of hope and hype." He added: "Indeed, the story of immune therapy for cancer … is rooted in human psychology, which Mr. Hall conveys in a series of fascinating biographies. Rarely is one privileged with such a view—neither jaundiced nor wide-eyed but clear and insightful, reaching deeply into the mind of the modern medical scientist."

A good deal of human drama olds as A Commotion in the Blood traces the discovery of interferon by Jean Lindenmann and Aleck Isaacs in 1956 while they were studying viral interference and potential antiviral agents—a purpose for which it proved largely ineffective—followed by Ion Gresser's 1968 findings that it caused cancer regression in mice. At that time, the world's supply of interferon was painstakingly produced by extracting it from liters of human leukocytes, and greed on the part of the Biogen company diverted research into interferon cloning for its own profits. Then, in 1975, Doris Morgan discovered interleukin-2 while working in Robert Gallo's laboratory at the National Cancer Institute. Her discovery, however, did not match his egomaniacal preconceptions of what the laboratory's goals should be—finding the growth factor for the human myeloid leukemia virus. Her findings were largely buried and she was unfairly dismissed from her position with the National Cancer Institute only three years after making her landmark discovery. Meanwhile, in 1975, Steven Rosenberg, also of N.C.I., was testing the infusion of pig lymphocytes into terminally ill cancer patients, a practice that has been termed "dubious" and "pathetic." Rosenberg did, however, recognize the clinical potential of interleukin-2, but, according to Hall, his inept scientific practices actually stalled research into cancer treatment.

In Merchants of Immortality: Chasing the Dream of Human Life Extension Hall addresses mankind's fascination with living a longer life. Legitimate scientists agree that there is no fountain of youth—no single action or elixir that will enable a person to live forever, or to maintain their youthful appearance and health long into old age. However, at the same time, many scientists are striving to lengthen the natural life span of a human being through a combination of proper nutrition and exercise, vitamin supplements, and medical treatments. Hall's book looks at these modern-day answers to the fountain of youth, their development, and efficacy, as well as potential consequences, both medical and sociological. Joan O'C. Hamilton, writing for Business Week, remarked that "Hall makes the complicated and sometimes tedious mechanics of both biology and lab work come alive." A contributor to Kirkus Reviews called the book "a carefully documented examination of how society deals with life-and-death matters."

Hall addresses height and society in Size Matters: How Height Affects the Health, Happiness, and Success of Boys—and the Men They Become, looking at the ways in which a man's height affects his attitude toward life and his ability to succeed. He looks at historical measures that seem to equate height with leadership qualities and an ability to earn higher wages, and he shows how average height reflects upon the overall health of a nation's health care system. However, he also reflects on shorter figures in history and their accomplishments, proving that height is not everything. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews noted that "shortness is not a prerequisite for enjoying Hall's work, but concerned parents of short boys will find it particularly reassuring."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Business Week, August 4, 2003, Joan O'C. Hamilton, review of Merchants of Immortality: Chasing the Dream of Human Life Extension, p. 20.

Kirkus Reviews, May 1, 2003, review of Merchants of Immortality, p. 656; August 15, 2006, review of Size Matters: How Height Affects the Health, Happiness, and Success of Boys—and the Men They Become, p. 821.

Los Angeles Times Book Review, December 29, 1991, Edward Tenner, review of Mapping the Next Millennium, p. 2.

New England Journal of Medicine, October 16, 1997, Robert S. Schwartz, review of A Commotion in the Blood: Life, Death and the Immune System, pp. 1178-1179.

New York Times Book Review, March 15, 1992, James Trefil, review of Mapping the Next Millennium, p. 20; June 9, 2002, Daniel J. Kevles, review of Invisible Frontiers, p. 32.

Times Literary Supplement, June 3, 1988, Edward Yoxen, review of Invisible Frontiers: The Race to Synthesize a Human Gene, p. 605.

Wall Street Journal, July 8, 1997, Jerome E. Groopman, review of A Commotion in the Blood, p. A12.