Physicist’s message was written in German to a courier
A note that Albert Einstein gave to a courier in Tokyo, briefly
describing his theory on happy living, has surfaced after 95 years and
is up for auction in Jerusalem.
The year was 1922, and the German-born physicist, most famous for his theory of relativity, was on a lecture tour in Japan.
He
had recently been informed that he was to receive the Nobel Prize for
physics, and his fame outside of scientific circles was growing. A
Japanese courier arrived at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo to deliver
Einstein a message. The courier either refused to accept a tip, in line
with local practice, or Einstein had no small change available.
Either
way, Einstein did not want the messenger to leave empty-handed, so he
wrote him two notes by hand in German, according to the seller, a
relative of the messenger.
Actual words
“Maybe if
you’re lucky those notes will become much more valuable than just a
regular tip,” Einstein told the messenger, according to the seller, a
resident of the German city of Hamburg who wished to remain anonymous.
One
note, on the stationery of the Imperial Hotel Tokyo, says “a quiet and
modest life brings more joy than a pursuit of success bound with
constant unrest.” The other, on a blank piece of paper, simply reads:
“where there’s a will, there’s a way.”
It is impossible to
determine if the notes were a reflection of Einstein’s own musings on
his growing fame, said Roni Grosz, the archivist in charge of the
world’s largest Einstein collection, at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University.
While the notes, previously unknown to researchers, hold no scientific
value, they may shed light on the private thoughts of the great
physicist whose name has become synonymous with genius, said Mr. Grosz.
(The Hindu)
