Einstein- Husband, Lover and Father

evilsheep writes "A large collection of correspondence shedding light on Einstein's personal life and perspectives was made public today by The Albert Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Spanning almost 3500 pages, the correspondence encompasses letters to and from his first and second wives and children between the years 1912- 1955.This newly released batch of letters fill in details to create a 'higher resolution' image of Einstein beyond what was previously known of his personal life. The collection has been in the Einstein Archives at the Hebrew University for many years, but was not made public in accordance with the will of Einstein's stepdaughter, Margot, who specified that they not be revealed until 20 years after her death. Margot died in July 1986. Einstein wrote almost daily letters to his second wife Elsa and to her daughter Margot whilst away from home about delivering and listening to boring lectures, playing music with friends, or trying to stop smoking."

Comments

Einstein's wife

[generic-man]

http://extempore.livejournal.com/136440.html?threa d=2964216#t2964216

In one letter, written in 1914, less than two years before Einstein revolutionized science with the publication of his theory of relativity, he tried to impose extraordinary conditions of marriage on his first wife, Mileva. He told her:

1) You will expect no affection from me and you will not reproach me for this;

2) You must answer me at once when I speak to you;

3) You must leave my bedroom or study at once without protesting when I ask you to go;

4) You will promise not to denigrate me in the eyes of my children, either by word or by deed.
---
In another letter, he wrote: "I treat my wife as an employee whom I cannot fire. I have my own bedroom and avoid being alone with her."

It's in a journal, so it's probably true. I wonder if this is actually provable with dead-tree sources (the article the poster cites is not on the web).

Re:Einstein's wife

[generic-man]

http://www.cnn.com/TECH/9611/25/christies.einstein /

Found it! Thank you, CNN (and Google).

Re:misleading

[GuruBuckaroo]

I have a stepbrother with schizophrenia. I've seen the effect it has on his father, my mother, and all of those around him. I've also thought that it may have been better that he never been born. Doesn't mean I wish he hadn't, but it certainly would have been easier.

For years, his father watched him deteriorate, and could get no help for him. No-one treated his problem as serious - until he put an axe in his girlfriend's back. Since then, he has spent his life in institutions (thankfully not prison, which would be no help at all). He cannot live alone, has almost no social skills, and is very easily shaken into paranoid episodes - which cause him to quit taking his meds, which make it all worse. Yet through it all, his father has remained supportive, trying his best to cope with his son's illness, and my mother as well - who volunteered into this relationship, knowing (but perhaps not really knowing) how bad it could get. They do not wish he were never born. But still, perhaps it would have been better... How would you feel, if this were your son?

Thoughts such as these do not make a person less noble. They make him human.

Re:CNN's Article

[not already in use]

Start talking quantum physics to a woman and it's not long before the clothes come off.

Re:CNN's Article

[kisrael]

That's the trouble with women, the faster you know they are, the harder it is to know where to find 'em.

Offtopic. Tesla's Birthday!

[Anonymous Coward]

With all due respect to Einstein, what I really want to see today is a story covering Nikola Tesla's 150th anniversary (he was born 150 years ago today, July 10th 1856).