Review: Einstein: His Life and Universe

The book is a well-researched and well-referenced biography. Walter Isaacson is the former Managing Editor of Time mag and CEO of CNN. (He’s a distinguished biographer though even before he assumed many of these executive roles). His own fascination--bordering on idolatry--with Einstein is evident on the pages. Why bordering on idolatry? For one, I think the book’s treatment on Einstein’s first wife is unfair or not balanced. But save for this one minor quibble, the book is near perfect. I can imagine that the author has an army of fact-checkers, archivists, and professional reviewers (Professors/Physicists) in the making of this book. The book benefited from these assets, evident up to the bibliography (for further reading). If you consider that the author probably paid for these services, the book should be a good buy, like a machine delivered after thorough R&D :-)

The first chapter until the part on Einstein’s Miracle Year and formulation for General Relativity are remarkable. The arguments with Bohr and the delving into thought experiments are engrossing. Chapters near the end (discussing politics and immigration to America) bored me a bit. This is probably not the fault of the book. This should be natural for most biographies formatted from birth death (not all decades will be full of excitement and achievement. Then the Epilogue on the strange journey of Einstein brain—the literal chopped-up, stored in a jar, and ferried-in-a-pickup-truck brain—propped me up again for a fascinating ending.

In ending, if I may digress a bit, there are so many quotes and anecdotes that are attributed to Einstein by so many people with vested interests--like the one about Einstein as a kindergarten proving the existence of God as an absence of heat whatever (there's even a youtube video for this). This book more or less contains all of Einstein's snippets, aphorisms, 'quotable-quotes,' and surely all major milestones in his life. There are even lengthy discussions by the author on possible 'misquotes.' So if the quote/anecdote is not in here, it's probably urban legend. 

And on hindsight yes, you can even use this nonfiction as a reference book for real, academic discussions. Some sort of 'semi-textbook' on certain topics on Theology, Physics, and Math. 

Definitely worth anyone’s money and time. The most expensive hardbound that Ive bought ever at that time. Im happy with the purchase.