Einstein's Dreams is a 1992 novel by Alan Lightman that was an international bestseller and has been translated into thirty languages. It was runner up for the 1994 L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award. Einstein's Dreams was also the March 1998 selection for National Public Radio's "Talk of the Nation" Book Club. The novel has been used in numerous colleges and universities, in many cases for university-wide adoptions in "common-book" programs. New York Times book critic Michiko Kakutani wrote about the book: "As in Calvino's work, the fantastical elements of the stories are grounded in precise, crystalline prose. As in Jorge Luis Borges's ficciones, carefully observed particulars open out, like doors in an advent calendar, to disclose a magical, metaphysical realm beyond."Einstein's Dreams was first adapted for the stage by David Gardiner and Ralf Remshardt and performed at the University of Florida in 1996. An off-off-Broadway production of this stage …
Einstein's Dreams is a 1992 novel by Alan Lightman that was an international bestseller and has been translated into thirty languages. It was runner up for the 1994 L. L. Winship/PEN New England Award. Einstein's Dreams was also the March 1998 selection for National Public Radio's "Talk of the Nation" Book Club. The novel has been used in numerous colleges and universities, in many cases for university-wide adoptions in "common-book" programs. New York Times book critic Michiko Kakutani wrote about the book: "As in Calvino's work, the fantastical elements of the stories are grounded in precise, crystalline prose. As in Jorge Luis Borges's ficciones, carefully observed particulars open out, like doors in an advent calendar, to disclose a magical, metaphysical realm beyond."Einstein's Dreams was first adapted for the stage by David Gardiner and Ralf Remshardt and performed at the University of Florida in 1996. An off-off-Broadway production of this stage version ran briefly at the New York Fringe Festival in 2001; it has also been performed in Beijing (2009). A musical adaptation of Einstein's Dreams, with book and lyrics by Joanne Sydney Lessner and music and lyrics by Joshua Rosenblum had its international debut in Lisbon in 2005. A concert performance of the Lessner-Rosenblum adaptation took place at Symphony Space in New York in 2009, starring John Bolton and Kate Shindle. The performance was a benefit fundraiser for the Harpswell Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded by Lightman, whose mission is to advance a new generation of women leaders in southeast Asia. The Lessner-Rosenblum musical had its Off-Broadway premiere at New York's 59E59 Theaters in November, 2019, produced by the Prospect Theater Company and directed by Cara Reichel.
If ever there was a book of prose deserving of being called poetry, this is it! The stories are simple yet delicate and leave a lot to ruminate about.
[a:Alan Lightman|8933|Alan Lightman|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1550028004p2/8933.jpg]'s [b:Einstein's Dreams|14376|Einstein's Dreams|Alan Lightman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1386925066l/14376.SY75.jpg|1820798] is, like the title implies, dreamlike. But don't worry if you don't feel like you're at Einstein's level when it comes to exploring the ideas he came up with in the early part of the twentieth century. This is an exploration of time, but not in a technical sense. Einstein would do what he called "thought experiments" from the time he was a teenager. Things like imagining what would happen if you chased a beam of light and sped up until you caught it. This short work of fiction is along those lines and at times it made me think a little of [a:Kurt Vonnegut Jr.|2778055|Kurt Vonnegut Jr.|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1433582280p2/2778055.jpg], a comparison Lightman might not like—he teaches physics and writing at MIT—but seems apt to me in some parts.
Einstein's Dreams is physically a tiny book, 179 pages long and six-and-a-half inches …
[a:Alan Lightman|8933|Alan Lightman|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1550028004p2/8933.jpg]'s [b:Einstein's Dreams|14376|Einstein's Dreams|Alan Lightman|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1386925066l/14376.SY75.jpg|1820798] is, like the title implies, dreamlike. But don't worry if you don't feel like you're at Einstein's level when it comes to exploring the ideas he came up with in the early part of the twentieth century. This is an exploration of time, but not in a technical sense. Einstein would do what he called "thought experiments" from the time he was a teenager. Things like imagining what would happen if you chased a beam of light and sped up until you caught it. This short work of fiction is along those lines and at times it made me think a little of [a:Kurt Vonnegut Jr.|2778055|Kurt Vonnegut Jr.|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1433582280p2/2778055.jpg], a comparison Lightman might not like—he teaches physics and writing at MIT—but seems apt to me in some parts.
Einstein's Dreams is physically a tiny book, 179 pages long and six-and-a-half inches long, four-and-a-half inches wide. The copy I got at a used book store originally sold for $17.00, in 1993. Pricey at that time.
It takes place in Berne, Switzerland, in 1905 and has a few very nice pen-and-ink illustrations of street scenes there by Chris Costello.
Dawn. A salmon fog floats through the city, carried on the breath of the river. The sun waits beyond the Nydegg Bridge, throws its long, reddened spikes along Kramgasse to the giant clock that measures time, illuminates the underside of balconies. Sounds of morning drift through the streets like the smell of bread. A child wakes and cries for her mother. An awning creaks quietly as the milliner arrives at his shop on Marktgasse. An engine whines on the river. Two women talk softly beneath an arcade.
You don't need to know any physics at all to read this book. It is a set of short stories more about psychological than physical time. I found it quite poetic and thought provoking. Each story is something Einstein could have dreamed as he explored the nature of time; in most, time goes at different rates depending on something else, such as which town you are in. In each, the author explores how that would affect the relationship between people. If you think carefully, you will realize that this is exactly what happens in our own universe.
Enchanting vignettes of altered fundamental perceptions of time.
Lovers of physics and fiction- this is a must-read.
You might have heard of time as another dimension,
but when time itself has many dimensions...
This book is awesome...
No equations..
no formulas..
no explanations...
just the beauty of physics.
Stunning book about the wonders and tragedies of time. Consisting of small vignettes held together by interludes about Einstein's life, the novel explores issues of what time might be. In essence, the conclusion seems to be that time is multiple and non-fixed.
