Fabulous Fiction Firsts #623

REVIEW WRITTEN WORD


In the same vein as fictional biographies such as Mrs. Poe by Lynn Cullen; The Paris Wife by Paula McLain; and Mrs. Engels by Gavin McCrea - in which intelligent women whose own aspirations and contribution were marginalized in favor of their spouses. Marie Benedict's debut gives us the story of Mileva Maric, a brilliant physicist and an extraordinarily gifted mathematician.

In 1896, before she was The Other Einstein, Mileva Maric´ was the only woman studying physics at Zurich Polytechnic and easily fell under the spell of a charismatic fellow student. Their courtship was kept secret not only due to the disapproval of the social-climbing Einsteins, but also for disappointing her father who held great hopes for her. An unplanned pregnancy, and failed qualifying exams sent Mileva home alone without any support from Albert.

When they eventually married, it was anything but the promises of being treated as an equal in both love and science. As a devoted mother of 2 boys, she was increasingly treated like a servant. The self-centered, womanizing Albert has no compunctions about deleting her name from papers they assiduously work on together, as a matter of fact, it has been hotly debated for over a century that Mileva might be the mastermind behind his 1905 groundbreaking ideas about relativity.

Benedict draws on many sources, especially letters from Albert, Mileva, and her friend Helene Kaufler, many of them now available at Princeton University's The Digital Einstein Papers Website. "Benedict insightfully portrays Mileva, Albert, and other European intellectuals of the time and dramatizes the difficulties a woman faced when attempting to enter that world. She also vividly captures the atmosphere, the cafes, the boardinghouse, and the customs of Mileva’s world, making for an engaging and thought-provoking fictional telling of the poignant story of an overshadowed woman scientist." (Booklist)