Thanks for posting. American Prometheus is one of the best books I've ever read. It gives you such a detailed look into the life of Oppenheimer without much interpretation, which you don't need because his life story is so intriguing. This book sounds like an interesting companion because there were times when I wanted more of an attempt to explain or understand some of the personality quirks and contradictions that wouldn't be at home in a pure biography. Will give it a read.
If you liked American Prometheus (which I agree is fantastic), have you read Richard Rhodes' The Making of the Atomic Bomb [1]? It's absolutely superb. It covers quite a lot of Oppenheimer's career, although the sequel, Dark Sun: The Making Of The Hydrogen Bomb, goes into more detail, not just Oppenheimer's famous trial, but also his family life and his lesser-known political work in helping form the Atomic Energy Commission.
> What’s harder for me to forgive is that, when asked later in life whether he felt any guilt for his participation in the bomb, he always said no. It seems to me that, when called to account for pain that we’ve caused — even indirectly, and even before we had full understanding of the pain we might be causing — we should take responsibility.
Expecting someone to profess guilt for the greatest accomplishment of their life is asking quite a lot. I think that Oppenheimer’s other actions demonstrated his remorse, even if he never said it.
As I write this in Los Alamos, North Korea's head of state has returned home from a dead-end meeting on curtailing its nuclear-weapons development, and uniformed soldiers are fighting on the contested border between two nuclear-weapons-operating countries.
:-(
Ironically, the 'LA' in 'la review of books' is, of course, Los Angeles.
