Kirkus Reviews  
5/3/2004

Technology Review columnist Jerome turns a brief newspaper reference he saw by chance into a fascinating account of the world-famous scientist's harassment by the FBI. Dozens of previous books have documented Hoover's surveillance of public figures, especially those he considered disloyal to his nation. But Albert Einstein, the genius physicist? Researching a project on the most prominent science stories of the 20th century, Jerome tracked references to Einstein published after his death in 1955. On page 17 of the New York Times business section for Sept. 9, 1983, he came across the headline "FBI Filed Reports on Einstein as a Spy and Kidnap Plotter." Interested and puzzled, he used the Freedom of Information Act to obtain the FBI's file on Einstein. What he found in those documents was the story not of Einstein the scientist, but of Einstein the crusader for civil rights on behalf of blacks, victims of anti-Communist witch-hunts, and other persecuted individuals. Although this is decidedly not a full biography of Einstein (the author counts at least 300 of those already), the monograph provides considerable enlightenment about aspects of his life apart from what the FBI recorded. The Bureau's files, not so incidentally, are filled with rumor and factual inaccuracies galore; the supposedly crackerjack law-enforcement agency comes across here as a den of law-breaking buffoons. Jerome suggests that Hoover and his agents cared less about truthfulness than about silencing celebrities who had left-wing ideas and intimidating the remaining population. Einstein emerges as a hero, refusing to let the federal government's underhanded tactics discourage his support of unpopular causes. A well-written, provocative account that could alter our views of both Hoover and Einstein

Created by  admin  on  6/22/2004

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