What was Isaac Newton like? Secretive, vindictive, withdrawn, obsessive, and, oh, yes, brilliant. His imagination was so large that, just "e;by thinking on it,"e; he invented calculus and figured out the scientific explanation of gravity.Yet Newton was so small-minded that he set out to destroy other scientists who dared question his findings. Here is a compelling portrait of Newton, contradictions and all, that places him against the backdrop of 17th-century England, a time of plague, the Great Fire of London, and two revolutions.
