Preview – Einstein: An Illustrated Biography

By Antony Esmond on January 27, 2016

Written by Corrine Maier
Illustrated by Anne Simon
Published by NoBrow Press in March 2016
Hardback with 72 pages in full colour – £13.99
Format 225 x 300mm.

‘Welcome to another dimension… where time and space are intricately woven… ‘

The Preview: On hundred years after Albert Einstein first published his General Theory of Relativity in the German periodical, Annals of Physics in March 1916, Nobrow is publishing a playful graphic biography of the great man’s life and ideas. Due to his immense curiosity as much as to his intellect, Einstein came up with a truly revolutionary hypothesis that has remained unchallenged to this day (despite numerous attempts to disprove it!).

Einstein is the third in Corinne Maier and Anne Simon’s collection of graphic novels exploring the lives of the most controversial and outspoken figures in modern history. In Maier and Simon’s inimitable style, this biography provides a beautiful and witty introduction to Einstein’s background, life, and legacy; full of intricate details and amusing insights.

Einstein falls into the same familiar yet hugely entertaining box as the previous two books on Freud and Marx that NoBrow published in 2013 and 2014. It is brilliantly quirky and strange and allows Albert himself to comment on his own life and death. One moment has him mentioning that medical science took his brain to experiment on after his death (whilst opening up his head and removing his own brain).

These books have remarkable charm that allows for their educational use to shine, employing the comics form as a learning tool in schools but also, along the way, educating this slightly stupid reviewer (who is substantially well past school age).

The art pops in every panel and scrambles over and around the page, making it a chase of a read. We dart from one clever and well constructed moment to another, always with a little wink at the reader.

The creators manage to use different angles, ploys and styles to convey information throughout this lovingly constructed hardback. At £13.99 it is also at a really affordable price.

An absolute gem from a company that seems unable to set a foot wrong.

The writer Corinne Maier was born in 1963 in Geneva. As a writer, economist, historian and psychoanalyst, she has produced around 15 non-fiction books on subjects like psychoanalysis, society, history and humor. Her books are bestsellers in her native France and some (such as Hello Laziness) have been translated into several languages.

The Illustrator Anne Simon was born in 1980 in France. She studied the Beaux-Arts in Angoulême and then in the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, one of the most prestigious art schools in France. In 2004, she received the “New Talent” prize at the Angoulême festival. Her first comic book Persephone in the Underworld was published in 2006.

<br /> • Einstein is on sale in all good bookshops and online stores from 5th March 2016. You can find more about this and other books by NoBrow Press at www.nobrow.net or on Twitter @nobrowpress it will also be on sale in all good comics and book shops – so keep your eyes out for it

Many thanks for reading.