Composer Peter Hugh White and librettist Clare Heath join host Rosie Millard in front of a London audience to explore why the story of chemist and x-ray crystallographer
Rosalind Franklin and the race to uncover the structure of DNA makes such a compelling subject for an opera.
We hear excerpts that capture the contrasting personalities at the centre of this scientific drama —
James Watson, the brash young researcher at the University of Cambridge;
Francis Crick, his more measured collaborator; and
Maurice Wilkins, an anxious biophysicist uneasy about being outshone by his brilliant colleague, Franklin.
It’s a story of ambition, rivalry, and betrayal: Franklin’s departure from King’s College London and the subsequent publication of the
double helix model by Watson and Crick, which was built on insights from her work — yet without giving her due recognition.