Oppenheimer: Portrait of an Enigma [Hardcover]

Jeremy Bernstein (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 1, 2004

J. Robert Oppenheimer was a puzzle to everyone. The nuclear physicist most responsible for the creation of the atomic bomb, he was a genius both scientifically and otherwise. His standards were impossibly high. He read widely in many languages, wrote poetry, and did superb science. Yet in Jeremy Bernstein's intensely interesting biographical memoir, Oppenheimer emerges as a man unsure of his identity and captive to an element of self-destructiveness in his makeup. Oppenheimer is the long-awaited book that many people feel Mr. Bernstein was almost born to write. As a former colleague of Oppenheimer's, he has composed a book that is both personal and historical, bringing the reader close to the life and workings of an extraordinary and controversial man. Oppenheimer once told the author that during the now-famous hearing in which he lost his security clearance—one of the most spectacular attacks of the McCarthy era—he felt it was happening to someone else. His lawyer at the hearing, after being with Oppenheimer day in and day out for several months, said he did not know him in any real sense at all. Yet everyone in the scientific community and in government agreed that without Oppenheimer's totally remarkable leadership at Los Alamos, the atomic bomb would not have happened, and the Second World War would have ended very differently. Filled with revealing insights and details that set the historical record straight, Oppenheimer is that rare quantity: a vastly entertaining study of one of the most important and enigmatic scientists of the atomic age. Illustrated with black-and-white photographs.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In his preface to this portrait, Bernstein (Cranks, Quarks, and the Cosmos, etc.) is up front with his intentions; "I make no pretense of trying to write a 'definitive' biography of Oppenheimer." Bernstein, a physicist who was a staff writer at the New Yorker for 39 years, is known for his profiles of top scientists, and this book is best understood as an extended magazine profile rather than an exhaustive portrait of the controversial J. Robert Oppenheimer. The author hits all the high (and low) points of Oppenheimer's life, from his role as director of the Los Alamos team that developed the atomic bomb to his struggles with the government during the McCarthy era, but we never really understand what made the physicist tick. Throughout, our view of Oppenheimer is firmly rooted in Bernstein's perspective, fleshed out in part through personal anecdotes of the rare occasions that their paths crossed. Though an interesting window into the physics community through the 20th century, the result is a relatively shallow biography that holds its subject at arm's length, filled with awe and the kind of whispered stories that graduate students pass back and forth about the paramount figures in their field. Bernstein's characterization of this as the New Yorker profile he never wrote may indicate its audience—curious general readers, not those steeped in science history. 7 b&w photos not seen by PW.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

Bernstein is the author of a series of celebrated New Yorker profiles of well-known scientists, but he never tackled Robert Oppenheimer. This essay, Bernstein says, should not be regarded as a full biography but rather as the Oppenheimer profile he never wrote. A physicist himself who studied briefly with Oppenheimer, Bernstein brings a mixture of scientific knowledge and journalistic accessibility to the task of explaining the enigma behind the man who brought the world the atomic bomb yet, less than 10 years later, at the height of the cold war, had his security clearance revoked by the Atomic Energy Commission. Drawing on trial transcripts, Bernstein recaps Oppenheimer's security case effectively and provides brief background on his work before the war and at Los Alamos. All of that information is available elsewhere, of course, but what makes this little book worthwhile is its personal view of the conflicted genius, happiest when surrounded by formulas on a chalkboard but never comfortable when the theoretical became the political. A fine introduction to an ever-fascinating man. Bill Ott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 238 pages
• Publisher: Ivan R Dee (March 1, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1566635691
• ISBN-13: 978-1566635691
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.8 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,005,352 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Interstitial Material, July 12, 2004

By 

Tim R. Niles "Nomad" (Silicon Valley) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Oppenheimer: Portrait of an Enigma (Hardcover)

This book has supplied insights and information which none of my readings on the topic of Oppenheimer or the Manhattan Project or Los Alamos (where I spent part of my childhood, hence the interest) has provided.

This is not a massive tome with large quantities of detail related to any one specific area of Oppenheimer's life, but provides information that tends to hold the massive amounts of data which has been written about him at a more personal level.

All in all, a readable, cogent, human book about a man whose life seems filled with contradictions and disparate interests.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Insight into an enigma..., August 18, 2004

By 

Ashutosh Jogalekar "Sciencecat" (Cambridge, MA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Oppenheimer: Portrait of an Enigma (Hardcover)

Jeremy Bernstein obviously admires J. Robert Oppenheimer. This is not surprising. Almost everyone who came in contact with his sparkling intellect idolised him. In the 1930s, as a Professor at Berkeley, his students were so awestruck by him, that they could frequently be seen imitating his mannerisms. There were a few who loathed him for his high brow attitude and sharp tongue. In fact, people who met him could roughly be divided into the above two categories. However, the latter formed an exception. The result is that he is generally considered by everyone who had known him, whether it was the janitor at Los Alamos, or Nobel Laureates, as an exceptionally brilliant intellect, and one who also had acute insight into human nature and the consequences of the atomic age.

Now in this new biography, Bernstein brings his well known skills at chronicling famous scientists to bear upon this remarkable man. There have been a few biographies of him so far. Probably the one by Peter Michelmore is most compelling. (The Swift Years: The Robert Oppenheimer Story)The closest that one can get to knowing him well is through his touching and insightful collection of letters, chronicled by Alice Kimball Smith and Charles Weiner.(Robert Oppenheimer: Letters and Recollections) But almost forty years after his death in 1967, what made him tick still seems a mystery. Was it his innate charisma and the blue, innocent, harrowing glare of his eyes, or his lightning fast mind? Was it his incredible knowledge about all things intellectual, from physics to Dante to the Bhagavad Gita? Was it his mesmerising command over the English language, a mixture of spell binding and obscure words, that drew hundreds to his lectures? Or was it his role as the Hamlet and conscience of the atomic age? Certainly all these factors contributed, but Robert Oppenheimer is still not completely unraveled.

However, Bernstein makes a sincere and moving attempt to do this. He is very well qualified for the task. Over the years, he has written extremely informative and entertaining biographies of physicists. He is also a well trained physicist himself and has worked at some of the better known centres of physics in the world-Harvard, Los Alamos and the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. Most importantly, he worked at this famous institute at a time when Oppenheimer was its director and some of the most acclaimed scientists were flocking there to work at the frontiers of knowledge. Emphatically, Bernstein does not intend this book to be a biography of Oppenheimer and it should not be treated as such (for that purpose readers should consult biographies by Bird & Sherwin and Cassidy). Instead, he says that this is 'The biographical column for the New Yorker which he never wrote.' Bernstein focuses on the main events in Oppenheimer's life which gives the reader much insight into his human nature. He begins every chapter with a curious and affectionate anecdote about his life. Like the time when the absent minded professor went on a car ride on a moonlit night with one of his female students, and then got out for a stroll and walked all the way back to his home, completely forgetting about her. Or warm recollections about the great man from some of the people who knew him the best- fellow Nobel Prize winning physicist and friend Isidor Rabi for example.

The most interesting part of the book probably is the one that sheds light on Oppenheimer's tenure as director of the Institute for Advanced Study, one of the most acclaimed intellectual ivory towers in the world, where Bernstein had an opportunity to observe Oppenheimer almost daily. The stories of the odd men and women who worked there during the 1950's make entertaining reading. For example, here's a hilarious exchange between an aggressive young American mathematician (AM) and an elderly French mathematician (FM) which Bernstein overhears:

AM: Prof. Leray, do you watch any movies?
FM: Silence
AM: What about gangster movies, Prof. Leray? BANG BANG?
FM: Silence
AM: Do you have gangsters in France, Prof. Leray?
FM: Yes, but they constitute the Government.

There were many similar small anectodes in this book which I did not know. The main focus in all of this is the towering intellect at the head of the institute. Bernstein discusses the warmth behind many of the small favours that Oppenheimer did for others, and the formal notes which he sometimes used to post on the notice board ('Members are kindly requested to play touch football out of earshot of the library'). Bernstein also discusses Oppenheimer's security clearance hearing, a painful event for him and his family, and a shameful act on the part of certain members of the Government. All through the book, the author brings an honest, personal perspective to the life of this great man, one who did commit follies in his life, but which I think should be excused in light of the great positive influence he had on people around him and on science in America. In that era of distrust and bitterness, Robert Oppenheimer was a guiding light to everyone and a champion of freedom, full of insight, compassion and understanding. It is important that he be remembered in the same spirit that Einstein and Russell are remembered. Bernstein's book helps tells us why.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Rambling and digressing -- what a disappointment!, February 11, 2006

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Kylo Ginsberg (Portland, OR USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Oppenheimer: Portrait of an Enigma (Hardcover)

Not knowing anything about Oppenheimer, I thought I'd dive in with Jeremy Bernstein's short bio. With Bernstein's credentials as a long time writer for the New Yorker, and as a physicist who knew Oppenheimer, this looked like a great intro.

I couldn't be more wrong. Sadly, this is a poorly written, poorly edited book. Bernstein's credentials intrude embarassingly often as he frequently inserts inconsequential and irrelevant asides with anecdotes about when he perchance met someone in the narrative. He comes across as self-aggrandizing (and without merit - ouch!).

That aside, he also writes poorly, not knowing how to organize his story, when to provide details, etc. I can't imagine I've ever read a book (especially a short 200 page essay) with so many awkward forward references: "I will come back to the matter ..." occurs far too many times for readibility. On the other hand, he will detour into a technical explanation of Plutonium-239 v Plutonium-240, then not use the information for any apparent purpose.

All that said, I can imagine that real students of Oppenheimer might find this interesting precisely for the odd tidbits he may offer that aren't in any other bios or narratives of the time. Such students also will find it easier to navigate through his disorganized narrative of the hearing and so forth. More general readers should look elsewhere. I myself will be trying Brotherhood of the Bomb next.