In Albert鈥檚 Shadow by Mileva Mari膰, edited by Milan Popovi膰, Johns Hopkins University Press, 拢18.50/$24.95, ISBN 080187856X Reviewed by Marcus Chown
FEW stories in history of science are as heartbreaking as that of Mileva Mari膰. As a woman born in the late 19th century, her aspiration to be a physicist was always going to the thwarted. But she had the added misfortune of falling in love with Albert Einstein.
In the beginning he was just a man of his time, leaving her to deal with children and domestic duties while he pursued his own interests. But, as he ascended into the scientific stratosphere, leaving her ever more lonely and isolated, she became prey to her own crippling insecurities, which plunged her into the deepest, blackest depressions.
Advertisement
During her life with Einstein and afterwards, Mari膰 corresponded with her closest friend, Helene Kaufler. Now Kaufler鈥檚 grandson, Milan Popovi膰, has published the surviving letters. Einstein scholars will comb them for their insights into the mind of Einstein during his earliest creative period. Others will be fascinated, and saddened, by the deteriorating relationship between Mari膰 and Einstein. And Einstein emphatically does not come out of this well.