False modesty is the peccadillo of the scientific memoirist. An example (imaginary) might read as follows: “While working at the Whitehead Institute X-ray crystallography laboratory on avian muscle protein, I became fascinated with the classical problem of autonomous folding. I was led to consider . . .” Well, I’m sure that such writers in real life were fascinated and even compelled to consider this or that, but not me reading their account. A reader would like to know the reason why they did the hard work to achieve their goal. Where was the adventure, what was the dream?
