Klett-Cotta, 2021. 398 pages. Nonfiction
There may never be another era of science like the first half of the 20th century. Many of the most important physicists ever to live – Marie Curie, Max Planck, Wolfgang Pauli, Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, Ernst Schrödinger, Albert Einstein – came together to uncover the quantum world: a concept so shockingly contrary to traditional physics that its own founders initially rebelled against it. Hürter takes us back to this momentous time when war and revolution upended the lives of renegade scientists. These brilliant thinkers are revealed anew as friends and enemies, lovers and loners, and men and women just like us. Quantum mechanics is a concept too big for a single mind – and its birth is a testament to the boundless potential of collaboration.
Having a background in science, I had heard of all of these scientists and their discoveries. However, my formal education focused more on the interactions between the ideas, whereas Hürter here portrays them as real people, showing how their complex individual and professional lives interacted (and sometimes clashed). The writing is exquisite and flawless, which isn't always the case for work on scientific topics -- or for any narrative nonfiction, for that matter. If you're looking for a deep dive into the science, you might want to look elsewhere. On the other hand, you don't need any sort of prior knowledge to fully appreciate this work, making it quite accessible to the average reader. I'd recommend this to any nonfiction reader interested in science or history.