On the humanity behind the icon. The Greys make the Gods relatable.
April 16, 2022
I got the opportunity to see the Albert Einstein Museum in Bern today.
The city is significant because he not only spent his early years as a scientist, but also wrote the world's most famous scientific equation here.
E = Mc²
And whenever I study the greats of the world, I am always left with the feeling that while we love to deify our heroes, we fail to acknowledge their humanity.
In fact, we want to ignore it as best we can, and it undermines the public narrative to speak of their more human/weaker/flawed sides.
Which is wrong from both a historical and a narrative perspective.
Some things I saw today/studied a bit more deeply that made me think and probably resonate more with the human behind the Icon.
The entrance. Musée Einstein Museum, Bern.
Childhood in Munich, 1889. Class photo. Only a few teachers could cater to his needs. Rote learning bored the boy. Conflicts with his teachers were frequent.
"Albert Einstein is a late developer and a loner." Couldn't speak properly at age three. The other kids called him "brother bore."
Summer of 1900. Only passed his exam with mediocre marks. Mileva fails hers. For two long years, he has found no permanent post. Makes a precarious living as a temporary teacher and private tutor.
"What became of Lieserl?" A secret pre-marital pregnancy. Daughter born January 1902. After 1903, all trace of Lieserl is lost. Albert never even saw her.
Einstein's application to teach, Bern, 17 June 1907. Rejected for the second time. In 1903, he couldn't list a single scientific publication.
Student attendance register, Bern 1908. Only three students attended his lecture. They were his friends from the Patent Office.
From here until the Nobel Prize, it was a reasonable run, during which he maintained dual citizenship in Germany and Switzerland and, in fact, had a diplomatic passport issued to him by the Germans.
Cut to WW2, where the same led to all his money being frozen by the Third Reich, and his fortunes suddenly changed.
With all his global standing and intellectual might, there was not much he could do.
Einstein's Swiss Passport. Dual citizenship. Swiss and German.
Third citizenship. US Certificate of Naturalisation, No. 5013865.
Exile in Princeton. Applied for naturalisation in 1935. In 1940, he made his oath of allegiance to the American Constitution.
TIME magazine. "Cosmoclast Einstein. All matter is speed and flame."
1952. Einstein is offered the post of President of Israel.
He rejects it. Feels himself too inexperienced in politics and too old for such a task.
And in such an Iconic and eventful life, still found the time to be fully polyamorous.
Yup, very little written about it. Between his two marriages and numerous loves. An important dimension to keep in mind as we admire the man. And I get it.
Elsa was his first cousin and his second wife. She wrote: "Such a genius should be irreproachable in every respect. But nature does not behave this way, where she gives extravagantly, she takes away extravagantly."
"ONE SHOULD DO WHAT ONE ENJOYS, AND WON'T HARM ANYONE ELSE." Einstein preferred what we would call free love today.
What an amazing life and what a human story.
I find the Greys make the Gods so much more human and relatable that we must try and see them in totality — to know and love them so.
