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The Nobel Prize

A History of Genius, Controversy, and Prestige

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The Nobel Prize

Written by: Burton Feldman
Narrated by: David Drummond
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About this listen

Founded 100 years ago by the inventor of dynamite, the Nobel Prize is the world's most celebrated and controversial honor. It grants its winners instant celebrity and acclaim for "service to mankind", despite accusations that it is too trendy, arbitrary, and narrow-minded. In examining both its fame and notoriety, Burton Feldman opens up the Nobel institution and process: how it originated, how it works, and how it is influenced by outside pressures (political, moral, personal, and academic).

The Nobel Prize is an extraordinary work that never fails to surprise, provoke, and entertain. This is the only book to explore every aspect of the prize: its founder, its aura, all its fields (literature, physics, chemistry, medicine, peace, and economics), and its laureates' personalities and rivalries, as well as the Nobel's controversies and blunders.

©2000 Burton Feldman (P)2011 Audible, Inc. 20th Century World Funny
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What the critics say

"Feldman relates the lively history of the most prestigious merit awards in consistently engaging fashion, touring its century-long existence forward from the will of dynamite mogul Alfred Nobel.... Feldman chronicles the evolving preferences of the Swedish awarding committees (e.g., their favoring of particle physics over astrophysics) and their quirks, exemplified by the truly bizarre awarding of the prize in medicine to the inventor of the lobotomy. In pointing out such mistakes, the mediocrities who got prizes, and the worthies - Emile Zola, Edwin Hubble, Mahatma Gandhi, etc. - who didn't, Feldman reveals the human side of the Nobels." (Booklist)

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Profile Image for Roberta W

Almost there

I appreciate this book partly for its origins: the author looked for a book on the Nobel prize and there wasn’t one that told him what he wanted, so he wrote it.
It is really quite good, although a bit dry in spots. It’s no small thing to describe a scientific discovery that someone won the prize for in a few sentences. Yes, it skims the surface but does draw parallels, and also puts the prize in world and political context. It also explores who didn’t win, and why.
If there was an audiobook that deserved a free PDF accompaniment, then then was it but, alas, there wasn’t one. I would have rated the book higher if it did.

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