A Brain in a Million: Einstein, His Life and Universe, by Walter Isaacson

Review by Bruce Collier July 12, 2007 Issue

Walter Isaacson has a taste for polymathic types and grand-scale thinkers. His previous books have been on Benjamin Franklin and Henry Kissinger, among other subjects. This time it’s Albert Einstein. At 675 pages, Einstein, His Life and Universe is a substantial work, heavily footnoted, with 12 closely spaced pages of sources. The concentration required is worth the trouble.

Isaacson follows his subject from birth to shortly after his death. Einstein corresponded with many people, from private citizens to kings and presidents. Isaacson lets him tell his story mainly in his own words, using personal letters recently released. In addition to the letters, there are Einstein’s books and, of course, his papers. The latter are almost incomprehensible to anyone without an education in math and physics. This is the challenge in any book about Einstein. Isaacson does an excellent job making it clear most of the time.

A great part of Einstein’s early career was spent trying to find a job as a teacher in Germany. Absurd as it seems now, few schools were interested in having Einstein on their faculty. Part of it was his attitude — he was cocky and irreverent about what he knew — and part of it was because he was a Jew. Ironically for the anti-Semites of Germany, and happily for the rest of the world, driving out all the Jewish scientists would ultimately seal their fate.

Einstein would not have found this turn of events remarkable. His favorite aphorism was, “God does not play dice with the universe.” This philosophy led him on a lifetime search for a “unified field theory,” a master equation that would explain everything physical in the universe. Though never a particularly devout or observant Jew, his thinking and experience nevertheless compelled him toward, rather than away from, a belief in God. Another of his famous statements, ultimately carved on a fireplace mantel in Princeton, was “Subtle is the Lord, but malicious he is not.” He later clarified this, “Nature hides her secret because of her essential loftiness, but not by means of ruse.” Or, as they said on The X-Files, the truth is out there.

His life was not all work, either. When he wasn’t pondering the big questions, Einstein found time to turn himself into an excellent violinist. He also married twice and fathered two children. Considered handsome in his youth, he maintained a highly original look all his life. Rumpled clothes, a wispy halo of white hair, droopy mustache, and shoes without socks must have been appealing, because Einstein seldom lacked for feminine companionship, even while married. He was the prototype for the absentminded professor, a role he relished.

One of the most interesting parts of the book relates Einstein’s role in the making of the atomic bomb. According to Isaacson, Einstein’s contribution was to get the ball rolling. His famous letter, warning Franklin D. Roosevelt of Nazi experiments in nuclear fission and their military application, led to the Manhattan Project. Despite the popular picture, this was about all Einstein did. His background and varied circle of academic acquaintances made him a security risk in the eyes of the wartime American government.

Also interesting was the fact that Einstein’s major scientific accomplishments were made in his youth. Einstein was the world’s most famous scientist by the 1920s, but he lived until 1955. Much of his later life was spent pursuing his unified theory, and grappling with his doubt about quantum theory and uncertainty principles. Einstein was never thoroughly convinced of it, says Isaacson, though he conceded that some of it might be valid. What troubled him about it was its inclination to deny a separate reality, a state of the universe that exists independent of our attempts to comprehend and explain it. Physics is not the universe, he once wrote, but simply what we say about the universe.

It was this humility that set him apart from other scientists of his time — and subsequent times — and enabled him to mingle with fellow geniuses and with his neighbors in Princeton. My favorite story in the book concerns an eight-year-old girl who lived near Einstein in Princeton. She needed help with her math, and went to the great man’s house, bringing fudge as an inducement. Einstein explained the problems to the girl, and gave her a cookie in exchange for the fudge. However, he insisted she do her own work.

Einstein, His Life and Universe, 675 pages, Simon & Schuster. Available at bookstores, libraries and online booksellers.

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