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Willy Seeds
Elizabeth Watson was James Watson’s sister. She frequently visited him throughout his time in Copenhagen and Cambridge—where she stayed during the final months of Crick and Watson’s research into the double helix structure. Watson’s narration shows that he clearly loves his sister, but his description of her also focuses exclusively on her appearance and love life, suggesting that traditional gender norms strongly influenced Watson’s thinking in the 1950s and 1960s.
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Elizabeth Watson Character Timeline in The Double Helix
The timeline below shows where the character Elizabeth Watson appears in The Double Helix. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 4
...during a group excursion and explained his interest in DNA. Wilkins flirted with Watson’s sister Elizabeth, who was visiting from the U.S., but didn’t follow up about Watson’s research interests.
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Chapter 15
...always invited a mix of scientists and left-wing intellectuals over for the holidays. His sister Elizabeth also visited from Denmark, where—to Watson’s horror—she was dating an actor. In Carradale, Watson spent...
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Chapter 24
...Then, Crick arrived. He reported on the success of his dinner party with Watson’s sister Elizabeth and the handsome French student Bertrand Fourcade. But Watson quickly turned the conversation to the...
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...days, while they waited for their molecular models. Meanwhile, Watson also went to dinner with Elizabeth, Bertrand Fourcade, and Peter Pauling (who talked about girls, as usual).
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Chapter 29
...Pauling, but they also used the X-ray technique that Bragg invented decades earlier. Watson’s sister Elizabeth agreed to type up the final paper, which Bragg sent to the prominent journal Nature...
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...That night, Linus and Peter Pauling, Francis and Odile Crick, and Watson and his sister Elizabeth all had dinner together. The next day, Watson and his sister flew to Paris to...
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