The Second Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Twentieth-Century Physics

Minireview: Crease and Mann's history of the development of relativity, quantum physics, quantum field theory and the Standard Model admirably combines engrossing prose with discussion of the physics that, while non-technical, is still thorough. They are helped by dozens of interviews with leading physicists, and include impressive notes with many references to original papers. There were some problems: the Higgs boson, perhaps the central issue of the Standard Model for the last couple of decades, is mentioned only in passing; the ten-year update from 1985 to 1995 seems haphazard in spots; and the optimistic discussion of string theory (while prescient in some ways) now seems hopelessly dated. But in the scale of the work as a whole, I show more found these relatively minor issues. show less

Excellent historical account of the development of particle physics up to the 1990s, not including the discovery of the top quark (1995) but discussing grand unified theories, super-symmetry, and string theory.