Why read The Last Man Who Knew Everything?

Book cover of The Last Man Who Knew Everything

Book description

In 1942, a team at the University of Chicago achieved what no one had before: a nuclear chain reaction. At the forefront of this breakthrough stood Enrico Fermi. Straddling the ages of classical physics and quantum mechanics, equally at ease with theory and experiment, Fermi truly was the last man…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Last Man Who Knew Everything as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Jonathan Daly

Author

I wanted to read this book to learn how Enrico Fermi could be the “last man who knew everything.”

It turns out he didn’t know “everything” about “everything,” but rather knew nearly everything in physics. Especially noteworthy was Fermi’s genius for both theoretical and applied physics. It was he, after all, who planned and carried out the first successful atomic chain reaction in a squash court at the University of Chicago and co-invented the nuclear reactor.

I loved learning about a relatively shy boy and a late bloomer (albeit with a photographic memory!) who became a brilliant, extremely supportive teacher…

From Jonathan's list on Jonathan Daly's favorite books about individuals who followed their muse and changed the way we see the world.