Q & A with Bulent Atalay

Bulent Atalay

by Kathleen Sheridan

Like a reader of one of his books, Bulent I. Atalay is starting a new chapter. After an illustrious career that combined teaching in the UMW classroom, presenting lectures around the world, and writing a handful of highly acclaimed books, the professor emeritus of physics is rising to the occasion of retirement.

Atalay is approaching this new period with enthusiasm (tempered by a tinge of uncertainty), energy, and myriad plans, which include writing another book or two, painting, traveling, and spending more time with his grandchildren.

By his side will be his wife of nearly 47 years, Carol Jean Masker Atalay ’65, who recently retired from her job as senior licensure analyst for Stafford County Public Schools. Their daughter, Jeannine Atalay Harvey ’86, lives in Northern Virginia and works for PBS. Their son, medical doctor Michael Atalay, who earned degrees from Princeton and Johns Hopkins universities, lives in Providence, R.I., where he is on the faculty of Brown University Medical School. Both Jeannine
and Michael are married , and between them they have six children. This summer, the whole clan will gather for a week in Corolla, N.C., to vacation in a house owned by close friend Bernard Mahoney, UMW distinguished professor emeritus of chemistry.

Atalay was born in Turkey, the son of a Turkish four-star general who had served as a military attaché to London, Paris, and then Washington, D.C. The young physicist began his career at Mary Washington in 1966 after earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Georgetown University. He completed his doctoral thesis in theoretical nuclear physics at Georgetown after arriving at UMW, and later did postdoctoral work at University of California, Berkeley; Princeton; and Oxford. In
1974, he became a full professor. For more than four decades, he incorporated his passion for art and archaeology into his physics classes.

Atalay is a sought-after speaker and scholar who has won international recognition for his professional presentations as well as published books and articles. His most recent book,
Leonardo’s Universe: The Renaissance World of Leonardo da Vinci (National Geographic Books, 2009), co-authored with former graduate student Keith Wamsley ’03, was listed among the
Britannica Blog’s “Ten Must-Have Books for the Year.” An earlier book, Math and the Mona Lisa: The Art and Science of Leonardo da Vinci (Smithsonian Books, 2004), has been published
in 12 languages.

Atalay recently began work on two new books – one on scientific creativity with Wamsley for National Geographic Books and another for Smithsonian Books, tentatively titled Beethoven, Newton, and Leonardo: Patterns in Creativity, with composer Alan Fletcher, president of the Aspen
Music School. An accomplished artist, Atalay has produced two books of lithographs, Lands of Washington: Impressions in Ink and Oxford and the English Countryside. Collections in the White House, Buckingham Palace, and the Smithsonian Institution include his work.

During retirement, he plans to return to art, devoting time to an earlier passion, painting.

In 1998, Atalay received the University’s Simpson Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching; he also received the 2004 Student Council Excellence in Teaching award for the physics department. He received the emeritus distinction at this year’s Commencement.

With his customarily full calendar of speaking engagements, in the last year Atalay has participated in a panel discussion on creativity for the National Science Foundation and has delivered keynote addresses at the Smithsonian Resident Associates Program, the National Institutes of Health, Washington, D.C.’s Cosmos Club, the National Geographic Explorers Club, the Aspen Institute, the University of Virginia Darden School of Business, Yale University, and Virginia Commonwealth University da Vinci Center. In May, he gave a series of talks to science and math teachers at the Atlanta Aquarium, with a tank of beluga whales as a backdrop.

As he looked back on a notable career, Atalay said of retirement, “It’s time to give younger physicists a chance.” He quipped, “I’ve graded my share of exams,” but added, “I will miss UMW very much, especially the students.”

At one of several retirement parties recently given in his honor, Atalay raised a glass “to those who taught me, those with whom I’ve taught, but especially to those whom I have taught.”

He sat down with UMW Magazine to share more thoughts on this new phase of his life.

 

Q. What do you love most about UMW?

Atalay at his desk, early in his career

I have been able to do what I wanted: I could teach, which I loved, but I also had time for my outside interests − art and archaeology. There was no pressure to publish for the sake of publishing, and when I did publish, it was as a labor of love.

Q. What would you change about UMW?

I liked it better when we had full faculty meetings, which were akin to New England town meetings. We were still small enough that we could do that. But when we started having Faculty Senate meetings, you had a small group of people running an important component of the entire institution. We didn’t get to meet faculty from other departments.

Q. How would you describe yourself?

I’m an exceptionally curious person, and I know I could have been happy in so many fields. I love physics, but I know I don’t have to confine myself to it. I do the arts; I cross borders. In teaching, I seek connection between physics and mathematics on one hand, with the arts, music, and history on the other. The prevailing zeitgeist in society influences the artist and the scientist alike.

Q. What motivates you?

Curiosity about the universe, great art, great music. After Math and the Mona Lisa was published, an Italian publisher invited me to have a half-hour private audience, not with the pope, but with Leonardo’s The Last Supper. That was infinitely more interesting to me, spending time communing with Leonardo. I saw new details. Leonardo was experimenting, and he was not afraid to fail. A scientist knows that: Experiments frequently fail. That’s how you learn. He was the ultimate scientist doing art, and the ultimate artist doing science. When I was a student at Georgetown, I observed that the pre-med students memorized everything; I preferred the approach of physics and mathematics majors, who were looking for more insight.

Q. What inspires you?

Leonardo’s modus operandi, more so in the last 15 to 20 years. Around 4,000 to 5,000 pages of his notes have survived of the original estimated 20,000. I have gone through every one of those pages many, many times, and it’s just a pleasure to see how his mind worked. He jumped from topic to topic all the time – science to art, art to science. His anatomical drawings – which he did to satisfy his own curiosity − are the best ever produced. He was essentially an uneducated, or unlettered,” man who became the most eloquent spokesman for a liberal arts education. He was quite simply the best in the myriad fields in which he delved. I used to publish technical papers that appealed to about 18 people in the world. But then in 2000, I was teaching a class called “Character of Physical Law.” I told the students not to take notes, that I would do it. Those notes became the seeds of Math and the Mona Lisa. None of us expected the level of success the book achieved. It was exciting material . . . it was about the real Leonardo. And I was grateful when Dan Brown (author of The Da Vinci Code) wrote his novel when he did. It brought Leonardo onto the big stage. I find travel rejuvenating. For three decades, I have given lectures about art, archaeology, astrophysics, and other subjects on cruise ships. It allows me to travel. The cruises go to manyv
destinations; later this summer, we will sail in the Mediterranean, as we have done many times, and then in the winter to Rio de Janeiro, which I’ve never visited.

Q. What are your passions?

Physics, art, architecture, history, mathematics − across the board. The intersection of art and science, of music and mathematics. What books have you read lately? Truth and Beauty: Aesthetics and Motivations in Science by Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar; The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac by Graham Farmelo; and A Life as a Soldier (1972), in Turkish, by a Turkish general who was a friend of my father. I love to read biography, especially scientific biography.

Q. What is something you fear?

Being out of the classroom for the first time since I was 5 or 6 years old. It is a terrifying prospect.
I received an email from the wife of a good friend, a successful businessman, which read: “Harvey failed retirement again. He purchased another business.”

Q. What would people be surprised to learn about you?

I like to work with my hands, to do carpentry, and as a scientistartist, I like to unite form and function. I built the octagonal deck on the back of our house − without nails − and I employed a
cantilever design on the front part. Indian classical. I love hiking and sightseeing. My wife and I go to the Shenandoah Valley and climb a trail to the top.