Book
Edison's ghosts : the untold weirdness of history's greatest geniuses / Katie Spalding.
"Overturn everything you knew about history's greatest minds in this raucous and hilarious book, where it turns out there's a finer line between "genius" and "idiot" than we've previously known"-- Provided by publisher.
Record details
- ISBN: 9780316529525 (hardcover)
- Physical Description: 342 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm
- Edition: First edition.
- Publisher: New York : Little, Brown and Company, 2023.
Content descriptions
| Bibliography, etc. Note: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 307-332) and index. |
Search for related items by subject
| Subject: | Eccentrics and eccentricities > Anecdotes. Gifted persons > Anecdotes. Gifted persons > Biography. Gifted persons > History. Gifted persons > Humor. |
| Genre: | Biographies. Anecdotes. Personal narratives. Trivia and miscellanea. |
Available copies
- 1 of 1 copy available at Tsuga Consortium.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stroud Branch | 920.02 Spa | 31681010324028 | NONFIC | Available | - |
- Baker & Taylor
"Overturn everything you knew about history's greatest minds in this raucous and hilarious book, where it turns out there's a finer line between "genius" and "idiot" than we've previously known"-- - Grand Central Pub
Publishers Weekly Best Summer ReadsÂ
âAs Albert Einstein almost certainly never said, everyone is a genius â but if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.â So begins Katie Spaldingâs spunky takedown of the Western canon, and how genius may not be as irrefutably great as we commonly understand. While most of us may never become Einstein, it may surprise you to learn that thereâs probably a bunch of stuff you can do that Einstein couldnât. And, as Spalding shows, the famous prodigies she explores here were quite odd by any definition. For example:
Overturn everything you knew about historyâs greatest minds in this raucous and hilarious book, where it turns out there's a finer line between "genius" and "idiot" than we've previously known.
Â- Thomas Edison, inventor of the lightbulb, believed that he could communicate with the undead and built the worldâs very first hotline to heaven: the Spirit Phone.
- Marie and Pierre Curie, famous for discovering radioactivity, slept next to a lump of radioactive material for years and strapped it to their arms to watch it burn them in real-time.
- Lord Byron, acclaimed British poet, literally took a bear with him to university.
- Isaac Newton discovered the laws of gravity and motion, but he also looked up at the sun without eye protection. The result? Three days of blindness.
- Tesla, whose scientific work led to the invention of the AC unit, fell in love with a pigeon.
Edison's Ghosts is filled with examples of the so-called best of humanity doing, to put it bluntly, some really dumb shit. Â Youâll discover stories that deserve to be told but never are: the hilarious, regrettable, and downright bafflingly lesser-known achievements that never made it into our history books, until now.
