About the Author

Peter Smith regularly reviews science books for the Guardian, and has written for the Independent, the Financial Times and the Times Literary Supplement and other journals. In 1997 he was awarded a prestigious British Academy three-year Postdoctoral Fellowship, an award made each year to a handful of outstanding young scholars. He teaches at University College London where he is an Honorary Research Fellow in the Science and Technology Studies Department. His first book, Metaphor and Materiality: German Literature and the World-View of Science 1780-1955, was published in 2000 and according to one reviewer 'puts much other work in so-called cultural studies to shame.'

Reviews

'Peter Smith writes with admirable simplicity...this is a marvellous book' Daily Telegraph 'Einstein's complicated character is all here. He was a world celebrity, influential on high events and policies. But there was more to him than science and violin playing: his life as a young man includes episodes that would have been pounced on by today's tabloids ... Concise, complete, well produced and lively throughout ...' -- Roy Herbert New Scientist