Einstein on the Road Hardcover - 2011

Media reviews

"Just when one thinks that one has read every possible book about Einstein there comes along the new and delightful Einstein on the Road by the physicist Josef Eisinger. Once Einstein became famous he was invited to make several visits to places like Japan and Uruguay. He kept a diary that makes it clear that these trips were no picnic. Apart from the lectures, he was expected to appear at all sorts of social functions and wear the dreaded tuxedo. He was also ‘graded’ by the local German consuls who gave him high marks for exporting German culture. This was at the time when he was being vilified in Germany. The book is full of surprises and is a pleasure to read."
—Jeremy Bernstein, Author of Quantum Leaps

"‘The road is life,’ said Jack Kerouac, and here, as Einstein hits the road, life as he had not seen it before unfolds in front of him. As the newly famous physicist embarks on travels that take him from Europe to Palestine, Princeton, and Pasadena; from Ceylon to Singapore; and to Argentina, Japan, China, and other exotic places, we see Einstein amused, awed, and sometimes appalled as he absorbs what he sees around him and faithfully reveals his thoughts to his closest travel companion, his travel diary. In this book, Josef Eisinger brings us a delightful addition to the ever-expanding genre of Einstein studies."
—Alice Calaprice, Author of The Ultimate Quotable Einstein and Dear Professor Einstein: Letters to and from Children

"Einstein was a keen, sometimes caustic, observer of the world around him, and his travel diaries are a fascinating portal into a neglected part of his life. In vivid language and without being intrusive, Professor Eisinger has captured the elusive charm of Einstein’s prose."
—Robert Schulmann, Longtime director of the Einstein Papers Project at Boston University

"Josef Eisinger has uncovered an intriguing fragment of history here—the triumphal, wandering years of 1921–1933 during which Einstein and his wife were feted on four continents and in more than a dozen countries. He uses to the hilt witty and insightful commentaries from Einstein’s voluminous diaries. His wanderlust was compounded of the need to escape from the dangers and disturbances of that period in Germany, his love of long sea voyages seen as relaxing work opportunities, his insatiable curiosity about the world, and his desire to further humanitarian causes. But, finally, Einstein found in Princeton, when matters in Germany came to a head, the quiet backwater that he needed, and he stayed there for good after 1933. This may be the most delightful way ever to learn all that one really needs to know about Einstein."
—Philip Anderson, Recipient of the 1977 Nobel Prize in Physics

Citations

• Choice, 03/01/2012, Page 0