Exploring the science of literature

Two authors with a training in science - Argentinean crime writer Guillermo Martinez and Italian novelist Paolo Giordano - started off events at this year's Bookworm International Literary Festival in Beijing by trying to figure out how science informs their work.

Giordano, a PhD in particle physics, has switched vocation since his debut novel, The Solitude of Prime Numbers, became an international bestseller, got translated into 30 languages and won him Italy's most-coveted Premio Strega Award.

Now a fully committed writer, Giordano is captivated by the beauteous words in math and physics - "words that we do not normally use", as he puts it. By putting these together with other sets of non-scientific vocabulary, it is possible to create a many-splendored third language, he says.