§ II — The Person
Life
The patent clerk, the violinist, the refugee, the campaigner — and the flaws. Einstein as a human being, told without the halo.
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1879 – 1905
Early Years: Ulm to the Patent Office
A curious child who disliked drill, a student who skipped lectures, and a graduate nobody would hire: the unlikely road to 1905.
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1879 – 1955
The Person
A violin called Lina, a sailboat and no life jacket, no socks, and a habit of thinking in pictures: what Einstein was like.
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1896 – 1955
Family and Relationships
Two marriages, three children, and a good deal of unhappiness. Einstein was a more admirable public figure than he was a husband or father.
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1914 – 1955
Berlin, Exile, and Princeton
World fame in 1919, a target of the Nazis by 1933, and twenty-two years as the most recognizable refugee in America.
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1914 – 1955
Convictions
Pacifist, internationalist, critic of nationalism and racism, signer of the letter that helped set the bomb project in motion. Einstein used his fame, and it cost him.
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Corrections
Myths and Misconceptions
He did not fail math, did not win the Nobel Prize for relativity, and did not build the bomb. Sorting what is true about Einstein from what is merely repeated.