Kai Bird, a journalist and independent scholar, is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship. Martin J. Sherwin is Professor of History at Tufts University, where he founded and directed the Nuclear Age History and Humanity Centre.
“The definitive biography.... Oppenheimer’s life doesn’t influence
us. It haunts us.” —Newsweek
“A masterful account of Oppenheimer’s rise and fall, set in the
context of the turbulent decades of America’s own transformation.
It is a tour de force.” —Los Angeles Times Book Review
“A work of voluminous scholarship and lucid insight, unifying its
multifaceted portrait with a keen grasp of Oppenheimer’s essential
nature.... It succeeds in deeply fathoming his most damaging,
self-contradictory behavior.” —The New York Times
“There have been numerous books about Oppenheimer but they can't
touch this extraordinary book's impressive breadth and
scope.” —The Miami Herald
“The first biography to give full due to Oppenheimer’s
extraordinary complexity.... Stands as an Everest among the
mountains of books on the bomb project and Oppenheimer, and is an
achievement not likely to be surpassed or equaled.” —The
Boston Globe
"The definitive biography.... Oppenheimer's life doesn't influence
us. It haunts us." -Newsweek
"A masterful account of Oppenheimer's rise and fall, set in the
context of the turbulent decades of America's own transformation.
It is a tour de force." -Los Angeles Times Book Review
"A work of voluminous scholarship and lucid insight, unifying its
multifaceted portrait with a keen grasp of Oppenheimer's essential
nature.... It succeeds in deeply fathoming his most damaging,
self-contradictory behavior." -The New York Times
"There have been numerous books about Oppenheimer but they can't
touch this extraordinary book's impressive breadth and scope." -The
Miami Herald
"The first biography to give full due to Oppenheimer's
extraordinary complexity.... Stands as an Everest among the
mountains of books on the bomb project and Oppenheimer, and is an
achievement not likely to be surpassed or equaled." -The Boston
Globe
Though many recognize Oppenheimer (1904-1967) as the father of the atomic bomb, few are as familiar with his career before and after Los Alamos. Sherwin (A World Destroyed) has spent 25 years researching every facet of Oppenheimer's life, from his childhood on Manhattan's Upper West Side and his prewar years as a Berkeley physicist to his public humiliation when he was branded a security risk at the height of anticommunist hysteria in 1954. Teaming up with Bird, an acclaimed Cold War historian (The Color of Truth), Sherwin examines the evidence surrounding Oppenheimer's "hazy and vague" connections to the Communist Party in the 1930sAloose interactions consistent with the activities of contemporary progressives. But those politics, in combination with Oppenheimer's abrasive personality, were enough for conservatives, from fellow scientist Edward Teller to FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, to work at destroying Oppenheimer's postwar reputation and prevent him from swaying public opinion against the development of a hydrogen bomb. Bird and Sherwin identify Atomic Energy Commission head Lewis Strauss as the ringleader of a "conspiracy" that culminated in a security clearance hearing designed as a "show trial." Strauss's tactics included illegal wiretaps of Oppenheimer's attorney; those transcripts and other government documents are invaluable in debunking the charges against Oppenheimer. The political drama is enhanced by the close attention to Oppenheimer's personal life, and Bird and Sherwin do not conceal their occasional frustration with his arrogant stonewalling and panicky blunders, even as they shed light on the psychological roots for those failures, restoring human complexity to a man who had been both elevated and demonized. 32 pages of photos not seen by PW. (Apr. 10) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.
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