81 Books Like The Trouble With Gravity

Ever since I was a small boy obsessed with the stars, I’d read about how Newton deciphered the secrets of the universe. Yet he himself remained a cipher. So when I was given Christianson’s book as a present, I was enchanted. I place this book in the top three or four best all-time biographies I’ve ever read (and I’ve read plenty!).

Others—I recycle; this one—never. Christianson presents a vivid picture of the life, work, and relationships of this most brilliant of men. Some science biographies suffer from awkward writing, but for me, Christianson has seamlessly woven the complexities of Newton’s life and science together in rich, colorful prose. And what an interesting life it was! You will find other Newton biographies; I treasure this one.

Years ago, I decided to plunge headfirst into Newton’s great and famously daunting work, the Principia, to see what I could grasp. My education is in mathematics and physics, and I thought I’d give it a go. With Dana Densmore’s book by my side, I discovered, to my surprise, that the wonder of Newton’s achievements can be known to anyone, even to those without any particular mathematical training.

If you too are curious—and you must be—please get Dana Densmore’s remarkable book! She’s a mathematician who writes beautifully—she’ll walk you through every stage of the master’s thought. It’s a beautiful book to look at and have: Donahue’s meticulous graphics and translations in colored font are fun to pore over, alongside Dana’s intelligent commentary.

Twenty years ago, while driving to my favorite lunch-hour swimming place in Hawaii, I heard the renowned physicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar being interviewed on the radio about the release of his new book on Newton’s Principia.

Chandrasekhar’s goal was to present Newton’s thought and ‘mathematical craftsmanship’ in a way accessible to the modern reader. Long an admirer of Chandra and Newton, I was sold. This labor of love is the book to read if you want to know all about how Newton did it.

But in fairness, it is not really for ‘the common reader:’ its math level varies from simple to challenging. Yet there is so much there, even if you don’t get it all. The illustrations are big and clear; his technical and historical asides are fascinating and stimulating.

It was good luck when I stumbled across this marvelous Newton resource at a used bookstore in Edinburgh, Scotland. I open it frequently; arranged alphabetically, the answer always seems to be there. There are so many aspects to Newton’s life, writings, and science that a book like this—this book—is indispensable for anyone who spends time with the man or his ideas.

Running from “Aberration” to “Young, Thomas,” it encompasses everything in between: Newton’s family tree (under “Family”); writings on mechanics (under “Mechanics”); chronology, data, contents, and summaries of each edition of the Principia (under “Principia”); and details of every one of his published works (under “Works”). Of great use to me, too, are biographic summaries of his contemporaries (like Flamsteed, Halley, and Hooke), all concise and excellent.

Science is a structure constructed stone by stone. Building on the work of all who came before. None have laid a more perfect foundation than Sir Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein. I am amazed by the leaps of faith, journeys into the unknown, and foundational advances each of these scientific giants took through simple thought-experiments.

We all know about the apple which fell from the tree and Newton’s laws of motion and mechanics. But few have ventured into the intricacies of Newton’s Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica to read Newton’s own thoughts and appreciate his genius. Written in Latin and dense in theory, it’s no wonder few have dared try. But this book allows even the layperson to understand and appreciate the greatness of Newton’s work. It's a journey to understand Newton-the man, the historical context of his time, and how the Principia continues to impact our present-day world. A… show more.

I have had my copy since about 1972, when I was a penurious post-grad, and it lacks an ISBN, but it is based on a famous phrase that may or may not have been written by Sir Isaac Newton: “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants”, and it is an uproarious and undisciplined history of that phrase. Merton calls it a Shandean postscript, because there are parallels with the style of Tristram Shandy.

I am afraid (or so two of my more literate editors have assured me), Merton infected my own style to an extent, but you can just tell that he enjoyed telling a story, almost as though it came from Falstaff himself. Any would-be understander of science needs to read it, but if you cite it, don’t make the mistake of Charlesworth et al., who, in Life Among the Scientists,… show more.

James Delbourgo’s book shows that history matters. As the founder of London’s British Museum, Sir Hans Sloane has always played an important part in displaying our national heritage, and Delbourgo’s book explores the wondrousness of the artifacts he amassed from all over the world. But it also reveals how his wealth, fame, and success depended on the international trade in enslaved peoples during the eighteenth century. Sloane’s statue has not been destroyed, but it no longer stands prominently in the Museum’s entrance hall. Like Delbourgo, I believe we need to examine and confront the deeds of previous generations, and his book appeared while I was grappling with similar dilemmas about Sloane’s predecessor as President of the Royal Society, Sir Isaac Newton.

Don’t let the length (over 900 pages) of this biography put you off. Instead, immerse yourself in the slow and powerful current of author Richard Westfall’s superbly written and richly detailed portrait of the skills, achievements, and obsessions of the singular genius that was Isaac Newton. Westfall explains in a masterful way Newton’s mathematics, his physics, his heretical theology, his fixation with alchemy, his activities running the Royal Mint, and his disputes with other scientists. These features, and Westfall’s evocative description of the intellectual and social milieu of Newton’s 17th-century world, make Never at Rest a compelling read.   

2500 years ago, Pytheas, a clever Greek explorer, figured out latitude.

While there has always been a concept of longitude, it proved impossible to pinpoint, until... Sobel and Andrewes engagingly unravel the cipher of longitude that was cracked by the plucky John Harrison (he created the right tool, a clock that kept accurate time at sea: why is this important? Read the book!).

Convinced that the solution could only be astronomical, the scientific community was not amused. It was a dramatic conflict between the skeptical Board of Longitude (probably also jealous) and the skilled workaday carpenter-turned-clockmaker whose solution to navigation’s oldest puzzle was banausic.

In the end, our hero, the underdog, prevails (even if it took 250 years for Harrison to receive the respect he so richly deserved and earned).

The Three Body Problem is a real-life unsolved math problem concerning the motion of three bodies (think a star and two orbiting planets), all acting on each other by the pull of gravity. Given their positions and movements at times, what will happen in the future? Will they eventually fly away or fall into the star?  

The Three Body Problem is also a mathematical mystery by Catherine Shaw (a pen name – shhh), set in Cambridge in Victorian times, which contains three actual dead bodies, all of the mathematicians working on the eponymous problem. Another mathematician, who knew all three well, is accused of the murders. Luckily for him, his fiancée, though not a mathematician herself, is as much a truth-seeker as any, and her actions unravel the mystery while the reader gets a close look into the world of maths and the people who do it. Our amateur detective… show more.