Name: Bedtime Biography: Isaac Newton
Rating: 4.6 (160 reviews)
Author: James Gleick

Introduction

Bedtime Biographies are best when listened to. Check out the audio version to get the full experience!

A man sits under an apple tree. For hours he’s been contemplating a tricky problem, and he just can’t get his head around it. So he sits there under the tree and thinks. Suddenly, it hits him – not the answer to his problem, but an apple. An apple falls from the tree and hits the man on top of the head. This surely hurt – but it also knocked an idea into his brain.

Within an instant, the solution to the problem appears! He’s solved it! He jumps up to write down his idea and tell the world of his discovery.

You’ve probably guessed by now that the man in question is Isaac Newton, one of the most famous scientists of all time. If there’s one thing we all know about the man it’s that a fallen apple pushed him to discover gravity.

Well, there is so much more to Isaac Newton and his life than this single, almost certainly made-up story. In the next 30 minutes or so, let’s explore his life and work together.

Chapter 1

Isaac Newton was born on Christmas Day, 1642. His birthplace was a modest English farmstead in Woolsthorpe, a tiny village in the county of Lincolnshire. Newton's father, a man who’d never learned to read or write, died before he was born. This left his mother, Hannah Ayscough, to care for her newborn son alone.

As a child, Newton had a fantastically curious mind. He was fascinated by everything around him, from the functioning of gadgets to the mysteries of the natural world. He was especially interested in the movements of the sun. He was transfixed by the glowing sphere as it moved across the sky every day.

Chapter 2

In 1664, England was struck by an outbreak of the dreaded bubonic plague. The pandemic was so severe that Cambridge University was forced to close its doors. Most students retreated to their homes, happy to stay healthy and spend a few months taking a break from their books. Newton, however, was different. He saw this quarantine as an opportunity to delve deeper into his studies.

When Newton returned home, he set about his research with a renewed fervor. Sequestered away in his room, he began experimenting. His first focus was optics, light, and color. He tinkered with candles, mirrors, and prisms, attempting to uncover the fundamental logic behind light. His curiosity knew no bounds. In one especially dangerous experiment, he trained his looking glass on the sun, staring at the burning sphere until his eyes hurt.

Chapter 3

Newton’s first book was still warm from the presses when he began preparing the next updated edition. He desired to make the work more accessible so that the whole world could benefit from his ideas.

While working on this new, improved edition of the Principia, Newton got his biggest break yet. In 1703, his great rival Robert Hooke died. After a brief reshuffling of roles, Newton was elected as the new head of the Royal Society. He took to the position with particular aplomb, pushing his fellow scientists to abandon research into mysticism and the occult and focus more thoroughly on empirical pursuits.

What is Bedtime Biography: Isaac Newton about?

Narrated by Cathleen McCarron

Music by Federico Coderoni

Isaac Newton (2003) takes readers on an insightful tour of the life and mind of one of history’s greatest thinkers. It’s more than a plain account of Newton’s life and accomplishments. Instead, we get a revealing glimpse of his habits, obsessions and eccentricities. It all makes for a revealing and rewarding biography.

About the Author

James Gleick has written to great acclaim on the history of science and the impact of technology. His writing has garnered him the PEN/EO Wilson Literary Science Writing Award and the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books. His books have been finalists for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. His previous books include The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood (2012) and Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman (1992).