Newton: (Ackroyd's Brief Lives)

This third volume in Peter Ackroyd's series is a companion volume to 'Chaucer' and 'Turner'. It describes the life of Sir Isaac Newton who formulated calculus, hit upon the idea of gravity and did experiments which showed that white light was made up of different coloured rays.

About the Author :
PETER ACKROYD is the biographer of William Shakespeare, T.S. Eliot, Dickens, Blake, and Thomas Moore, and the author of the bestselling "London: The Biography." The subject of his previous Brief Life was J.M.W. Turner. He has won the Whitbread Biography Award, the Royal Society of Literature's William Heinemann Award (jointly), and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. He is the author of "Albion: The Origins of the English Imagination," and his novels include "The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde" (winner of the Somerset Maughn Award), "Hawksmoor" (Guardian Fiction Prize), "Chatterton" (short-listed for the Booker Prize), and most recently "The Fall of Troy." He lives in London.

Review :
""Newton" is both impeccably researched and a wonderful read. An afternoon in the backyard hammock with 'the grand autocrat of science.'" -"Los Angeles Times" "[Ackroyd] may well be the most prolific English author of his generation. And, which I find encouraging, he can write movingly and revealingly about Isaac Newton while being no more of a scientist or mathematician than I am." -Christopher Hitchens, "Vanity Fair" "Astute and beautifully written.... Not surprisingly, the prolific Mr. Ackroyd, who is the author of 12 novels as well as biographies of Dickens, Thomas More, and Shakespeare-not to mention at least four histories of London-excels at re-creating the look and feel, at once grubby and exalted, of Newton's milieu. And Newton the man comes through splendidly in all the sheer arrogance of his driven genius." -"The New York Sun" "The brief life of Newton meets a widespread need.... Ackroyd's writing is a great pleasure to read." -"The New Criterion" "A terrific piece of work... this is a wonderfully writerly book, never less than elegant in construction and execution." -"Spectator ""Written in splendidly elastic prose, each sentence a springboard for the next, it provides a concise, fair and highly readable biography of a singular genius'." -"The Times " "Ackroyd's essay on [Newton] is understated and elegantly constructed." -"The Guardian" "Beautifully written and engaging." -"BBC History" "The brief life of Newton meets a widespread need.... Ackroyd's writing is a great pleasure to read." -"The New Criterion" "A terrific piece of work... this is a wonderfully writerly book, never less than elegant in construction and execution." -"Spectator ""Written in splendidly elastic prose, each sentence a springboard for the next, it provides a concise, fair and highly readable biography of a singular genius'." -"The Times " "Ackroyd's essay on [Newton] is understated and elegantly constructed." -"The Guardian" "Beautifully written and engaging." -"BBC History" "A terrific piece of work... this is a wonderfully writerly book, never less than elegant in construction and execution." -"Spectator ""Written in splendidly elastic prose, each sentence a springboard for the next, it provides a concise, fair and highly readable biography of a singular genius'." -"The Times " "Ackroyd's essay on [Newton] is understated and elegantly constructed." -"The Guardian" "Beautifully written and engaging." -"BBC History"