Marie had her fair share of difficulty before finding success. She was born into a poor, patriotic family in Warsaw under Russian control. Women during her time were oppressed and discouraged from pursuing careers in fields such as science. She had problems affording college, but managed to work out a deal with her sister. Going to France was also difficult, but she managed to pull through. One of the major points in her life that, if it didn’t happen, could have made her go in a completely different direction was her mother’s death. Her mother’s death allowed her to distance herself from Catholicism and get closer to science. Marie could have been dissuaded from fighting for science at many points along the road. She could have given up any time someone ignored her for being a woman, invalidated her claims, or when her husband suddenly died, leaving her alone. Her persistence allowed her to reach a level of scientific greatness that few other women were able to achieve. Her biggest failure was the mistake both she and her husband made; carrying around radium. This gave them constant exposure to radiation. The fact that she lived to 66 is amazing considering the fact that she had begun her work with radioactivity almost 40 years prior.
Marie Curie: Tale of a Radioactive Life