Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman

From the author of the national bestseller Chaos comes an outstanding biography of one of the most dazzling and flamboyant scientists of the 20th century that not only paints a highly attractive portrait of Feynman but also . . . makes for a stimulating adventure in the annals of science (The New York Times). 16 pages of photos. To his colleagues, Richard Feynman was not so much a genius as he was a full-blown magician: someone who does things that nobody else could do and that seem completely unexpected. The path he cleared for twentieth-century physics led from the making of the atomic bomb to a Nobel Prize-winning theory of quantam electrodynamics to his devastating expos of the Challenger space shuttle disaster.

At the same time, the ebullient Feynman established a reputation as an eccentric showman, a master safe cracker and bongo player, and a wizard of seduction. Now James Gleick, author of the bestselling Chaos, unravels teh dense skein of Feynman's thought as well as the paradoxes of his character in a biography--which was nominated for a National Book Award--of outstanding lucidity and compassion.