A TRULY BEAUTIFUL

MIND
STORY OF A VISIONARY
ALBERT EINSTEIN
 Pre- Reading Activity

Who is a genius
according to you?
Who is a Genius?
 LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. To inculcate the ability to comprehend a
biographical passage.
2. To gain knowledge about life of Albert
Einstein.
3. To become aware of  the historical events that
took place during Albert Einstein’s life.
 TITLE AND INTRODUCTION
• The title of the chapter ‘A Truly Beautiful Mind’
refers to Albert Einstein as he was a great scientist.
• The title – ‘A Truly Beautiful Mind’ may let you
wonder how a scientist’s mind can be beautiful.
• It is because, in this lesson, we get to know about
another aspect of his life.
• His other side that he believes in humanity.
Moreover, he advocates world peace, non-violence
his entire life.
• That’s why the title refers to him as a truly beautiful
mind.
 CHILDHOOD AND SCHOOL DAYS
• ALBERT Einstein was born on 14 March 1879 in the German city NEW WORDS
of Ulm, without any indication that he was destined for greatness. • destined: fate
• Albert’s mother thought that Albert was a freak because he did not • Freak: a person who is
• Uttered: spoke
behave, talk or look like normal people did.
• Amateur: doing
• Albert Einstein started talking when he was two and a half years of
something for personal
age. When he finally did learn to speak, he uttered everything enjoyment
twice.
• Einstein did not know what to do with other children, and his
playmates called him “Brother Boring.”
• From the very beginning, since his childhood, he loved mechanical
toys - such toys in which machinery was used such as automated
cars, automated airplanes.
 SCHOOLDAYS AND TROUBLE……
• The headmaster of Einstein’s school told Einstein’s father that
Einstein would never be successful in whatever profession he chose.
• Einstein began learning to play the violin at the age of six, because
his mother wanted him to; he later became a gifted amateur
violinist, maintaining this skill throughout his life.
• But Albert Einstein was not a bad pupil. He went to high school in
Munich, where Einstein’s family had moved when he was 15
months old and scored good marks in almost every subject.
NEW WORDS: • The school where Einstein went had a very strict discipline which he
• pupil: student disliked. Due to that he often clashed with his teacher’s opinions and
• regimentation: extreme opposed them.
discipline • After prolonged discussion, Einstein got his wish to continue his
• Stifled: suffocated education in German-speaking Switzerland, in a city which was
• liberal: willing to more liberal than Munich.
understand and respect
other’s opinions
 Let’s do some questions now
Q1.

Q2.
 MATHS, PHYSICS AND LOVE
• Einstein was good at studies, he was highly gifted in Mathematics, so he
was exceptionally good in Mathematics and he also had an interest in
physics.
• Science was not the only thing that appealed to Einstein who was a very
handsome young man.
• Other than Maths and Physics, Albert Einstein liked one of his fellow
students, her name was Mileva Maric. He thought that she was very
clever, sharp and intelligent.
• They met at the University of Zurich. Mileva Maric belonged to Serbia
(that is why she is called a Serb).
• She came from Serbia to Switzerland because the University in Zurich
was one of the few Universities in Europe which gave degrees to
female students.
• Einstein felt that Mileva was a friend because she also liked art,
literature or music.
 WORK AND OTHER INCIDENTS
To be at odds means to be in
the opposition of someone, to
be against someone.
• In the year 1900, Albert Einstein was 21 years of age, and he patent: a document which
completed his graduation from the University but was gives the rights of an
invention to an inventor
unemployed.
absolute: measured, not in
• Einstein was supposed to check the inventions done by other relation to anything else
people and give them a patent. On the other hand, secretly, he
was making his own inventions too.
• Einstein later said the desk on which he worked was the office
of theoretical physics because there only he started working on
his inventions.
• In the year 1905, Einstein published his first paper. It was about
‘special theory of relativity’. In this publication it was written
that the measurement of time and distance is not absolute, it
depended on something else.
• According to the theory, if there are two clocks, and both are
moving, they will not show the same time. One clock will move
faster than the other.
RESEARCH AND FAME
• This theory of relativity gave us this basic formula of physics
- E = mc². E stands for energy, m for mass of the object and c
for the speed of the light in a vacuum. (Vacuum means where
there is no air and the speed of light in vacuum is almost
300,000 km/s).
• To put it into simpler words, Einstein said that when you sit
with a nice girl for two hours, it seems like two minutes. On
the other hand, when you sit on a hot stove for two minutes,
it seems like two hours—that’s relativity.
• Albert Einstein wanted to marry Mileva Maric soon after he
finished his studies but his mother, Pauline Einstein was
against this.
• Pauline thought that Mileva was very intelligent to be a wife
and she told Einstein that Mileva was also like a book and
was like him. As his mother was against this marriage, he
cancelled his wedding with Mileva.
PERSONAL LIFE AND MORE FAME
• After 16 years of marriage Einstein and Marić
divorced for the reason that they had been living
their lives apart for 5 years.
• Einstein remarried a couple months later with Elsa
Lowenthal.
• In the year 1915, he published one more paper
which was based on the General Theory of
Relativity. • After 5 years, the Germans
• Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in discovered the process of nuclear
the year 1921. fission - the process through which
• In 1933, when Germany came under the power of nuclear bombs or atomic bombs are
Nazis, (the famous Nazi ruler was Adolf Hitler), at made.
that time, Einstein left Germany and shifted to the • There were many scientists who
United State of America forever. escaped to America because of
Fascism.
• All the scientists were afraid that the Nazis could misuse the atomic bomb.
• Albert Einstein was requested by a colleague and so, he wrote a letter to the President of
America, Franklin D. Roosevelt on 2nd August 1939.
• This shows Einstein’s humanitarian quality. He wanted good for the people, he wanted
peace in the world.
• The Americans developed the atomic bomb secretly and dropped it on two cities of Japan
– Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
• He wrote an official letter to the United Nations Organization.
• Albert Einstein proposed to form a world government, but this
letter did not bear any fruit.
• For another ten years Albert Einstein was involved in World
Peace.
• He campaigned for world peace and democracy. His main agenda
was world peace and freedom of people.
• When Einstein died in 1955 at the age of 76, he was celebrated as a visionary and
world citizen as much as a scientific genius
New Words
 Deflected: changed direction because it hit something
Nobel Prize was based on the will of the famous Swedish scientist, a
scientist who belongs to Sweden, Alfred Nobel. It was established in
1895 and the first Nobel Prize was given in the year 1901.
 Emigrated: leave one’s own country in order to settle permanently
in another
 in an uproar: very upset
 missive: letter, especially long and official
 visionary: a person who can think about the future in an original
and intelligent way
 Questions for Notebook
3. What did Einstein call his desk drawer at the patent office? Why?
A. desk drawer-patent office ‘the bureau of theoretical physics’-stored his secret
papers-ideas on physics

4. Why did Einstein write a letter to Franklin Roosevelt?

A. Einstein feared-Germans-ruled under-Nazis-atomic bomb-wrote-president of the
USA-warn

5. How did Einstein react to the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

A. Einstein-deeply shaken-disaster-Hiroshima and Nagasaki-public missive-United
Nations-formation-world government-development of nuclear weapons.
 Long Answer Question
Q6. What was Einstein’s contribution to the knowledge of science? Which values in his
character made him a ‘global citizen’?
Keywords:
-Albert Einstein worked-ideas about relativity-1905-published-‘Special Theory of
Relativity’-time and distance-not absolute
-theory-relationship between mass and energy-famous formula E = mc 2-made him-
renowned scientist.
-earned international acclaim-publication-General Theory of Relativity-enabled him to
calculate in advance the extent of the deflection of light from fixed stars as it passed
through the gravitational field of the sun
-theory-declared as “a scientific revolution” by the newspapers
-contribution to the development of science-awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in
1921.-a number of honours-bestowed upon him--against arms build-up--advocated,
peace and democracy in the world--not want his invention should be misused
-thought of humanity, of world peace and democracy. All these values in his character
made him a global citizen.