Books like Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman

01

Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!

Richard P. Feynman · Memoir

Surely You're Joking, Mr.

Shares physics and curiosity with Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman.

02

Chaos: Making a New Science

James Gleick · Science

Chaos: Making a New Science, published in 1987, tells the story of how a loose network of scientists working across meteorology, mathematics, biology, and physics in the 1960s and 1970s developed chaos theory — the study of systems that are deterministic but unpredictable because tiny differences in initial conditions produce wildly different outcomes.

A kindred biography read.

03

The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood

James Gleick · Science

The Information traces the history of information — as a concept, a technology, and a way of understanding the universe — from the talking drums of West Africa through the telegraph, the printing press, the telephone, and into the digital age.

A kindred biography read.

04

The Double Helix

James D. Watson · Science

The Double Helix is James Watson's account of the race to determine the structure of DNA, which he and Francis Crick solved in 1953 at Cambridge.

A kindred biography read.

05

A Short History of Nearly Everything

Bill Bryson · Science

A Short History of Nearly Everything is Bill Bryson's attempt to understand the scientific story of everything — from the Big Bang to the emergence of modern humans — by spending three years talking to scientists and reading science history.

A kindred biography read.

06

The Physics of Everyday Things

James Kakalios · Science

James Kakalios, a physics professor at the University of Minnesota, takes a simple premise and executes it with unusual discipline: follow a single ordinary person through a single ordinary day, and explain the physics underlying every device and process they encounter.

Shares physics and curiosity with Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman.

07

Leonardo da Vinci

Walter Isaacson · Biography

Walter Isaacson's biography of Leonardo da Vinci is built around a simple and provocative claim: Leonardo's genius was not a supernatural gift but an extreme version of a learnable quality — curiosity.

Both dig into curiosity.

08

Big Magic

Elizabeth Gilbert · Self-help

Big Magic is Elizabeth Gilbert's manifesto for living a creative life — not as a professional artistic career but as an orientation toward existence.

Both dig into curiosity.

09

Our Mathematical Universe

Max Tegmark · Science

Our Mathematical Universe is Max Tegmark's argument for what he calls the Mathematical Universe Hypothesis: the bold claim that the universe is not merely described by mathematics but is a mathematical structure.

Both dig into physics.

10

Quantum Theory Cannot Hurt You

Marcus Chown · Science

Marcus Chown, a former radio astronomer and longtime science writer, takes two of the most counterintuitive theories in physics — quantum mechanics and special relativity — and presents them in a single short book aimed squarely at readers who find both intimidating.

Both dig into physics.

11

Seven Brief Lessons on Physics

Carlo Rovelli · Science

Carlo Rovelli, a theoretical physicist best known for his work on loop quantum gravity, wrote this book originally as a series of essays for an Italian Sunday newspaper.

Both dig into physics.

12

Six Easy Pieces

Richard P. Feynman · Science

Six Easy Pieces is a selection of six lectures from Richard Feynman's legendary Caltech introductory physics course, delivered in 1961–62 and published in full as The Feynman Lectures on Physics.

Both dig into physics.