Seven Brief Lessons on Physics


Seven Brief Lessons on Physics is a short book by the Italian physicist Carlo Rovelli. Originally published in Italian in 2014, by 2021 the book has been translated into 52 languages. More than a million copies have been sold, of which more than 400,000 in Italy.

Overview

The book condenses the revelations of post-Newtonian physics – from Einstein's theory of relativity to quantum mechanics – into seven brief, accessible lessons. These were originally serialised in an Italian newspaper. Rovelli uses a literary approach, for instance, highlighting a year Einstein spent apparently aimlessly with the comment that those who don't waste time, won't get anywhere.
The chapters are:
  1. The Most Beautiful of Theories
  2. The Quanta
  3. The Architecture of the Cosmos
  4. Particles
  5. Grains of Space
  6. Probability, Time and the Heat of Black Holes
  7. Ourselves