"The story of one of the most prolific, independent, and iconoclastic inventors of this century . . . fascinating."-Scientific American
A graduate of the University of Chicago and Saybrook University,
Marc J. Seifer, Ph.D., is a retired psychology teacher from Roger
Williams University. A handwriting expert who has testified in
state and federal court, Dr. Seifer has lectured at West Point
Military Academy, Brandeis University, the United Nations, the Open
Center in New York, LucasFilms Industrial Light & Magic, at Oxford
University and Cambridge University in England, and at conferences
in Canada, Israel and Croatia and for the Serbian Academy of
Sciences.
His articles have appeared in Wired, Civilization, The Historian,
Psychiatric Clinics of North America and Cerebrum. Featured in The
New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The
Economist and Scientific American, Dr. Seifer has also appeared on
Coast to Coast Radio, NPR's "All Things Considered," "The Morning
Show" in Canberra Australia, on the BBC, and on TVon American
Experience, The History Channel, and Associated Press
International.
Listed in Marquis' Who's Who in the World, he is also the author of
the novels Rasputin's Nephew, Doppelg nger, Crystal Night, and Fate
Line, and the non-fiction works Transcending the Speed of Light,
The Definitive Book of Handwriting Analysis, and Framed! Murder,
Corruption & a Death Sentence in Florida. His book Wizard- The Life
& Times of Nikola Tesla has been translated into nine languages
including Serbian, Russian and Chinese.
"Seifer's vivid, revelatory, exhaustively researched biography
rescues pioneer inventor Nikola Tesla from cult status and restores
him to his rightful place as a principal architect of the modern
age." ---Publishers Weekly Starred Review
"[Wizard] brings the many complex facets of [Tesla's] personal and
technical life together in to a cohesive whole.... I highly
recommend this biography of a great technologist." --A.A. Mullin,
U.S. Army Space and Strategic Defense Command, COMPUTING
REVIEWS
"[Along with A Beautiful Mind] one of the five best biographies
written on the brilliantly disturbed." --WALL STREET JOURNAL
"Wizard is a compelling tale presenting a teeming, vivid world of
science, technology, culture and human lives." --NEW SCIENTIST
"Marc Seifer is an excellent writer and scholar, who has produced a
wonderfully readable and illuminating biography of one of the most
intriguing men of this century... mak[ing] us understand not only
the man, but also the times in which he lived. . . . [A]
masterpiece." --NELSON DEMILLE
"The author presents much new material... [and] bases his book on a
large number of archival and primary sources.... Underneath the
layers of hero worship, the core of Seifer's book is a serious
piece of scholarship." --Ronald Kline, SCIENTIFIC
AMERICAN
"Seifer has done a remarkable job going through all the Tesla
manuscripts… ferret[ing] out hundreds of newspaper and magazine
articles in which he traces out Tesla's public image [and] offers a
reasonable reconstruction of Tesla's emotional world. . . . Seifer
has significantly advanced our understanding of Tesla." --Bernard
Carlson, author of Tesla: Inventor of the Electrical Age, for
ISIS
"It is my opinion that Dr. Seifer leads the world as the most
authoritative of all the Tesla researchers." --J.W.
McGINNIS,President, International Tesla Society
"Far and away the best job among Tesla biographies." --Jeffrey D.
Kooistra, INFINITE ENERGY
"Wizard is … utterly absorbing with chapters charting all stages of
Tesla's life.... Seifer treats his prodigious subject with sympathy
and realism." --NEXUS
"Wizard... presents a much more accurate... picture of Tesla....
[It] is thorough, informative, entertaining and a valuable addition
to electrotechnological history, past and future." --ELECTRONIC
ENGINEERING TIMES
"In modern times, Tesla may be enjoying a comeback thanks to books
like Wizard." --THE NEW YORK TIMES
"Here is a deep and comprehensive biography of a great engineer of
early electrical science. Indeed, it is likely to become the
definitive biography of the Serbian-American inventor Nikola Tesla.
.... Highly recommended." --AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR THE
ADVANCEMENT OF SCIENCE
From Publishers Weekly:
Seifer's vivid, revelatory, exhaustively researched biography
rescues pioneer inventor Nikola Tesla from cult status and restores
him to his rightful place as a principal architect of the modern
age. Based largely on firsthand documents including Tesla's
writings, his patents and those of competitors, it credits the
Croatian-born Serb, who moved to New York in 1884, with the
invention of the induction motor, long-distance electrical power
distribution, fluorescent and neon lights, the first true radio
tube and remote control, besides making vital contributions to the
technology underlying television, wireless communication, robotics,
lasers, the facsimile machine and particle-beam weaponry
anticipating the space-based "Star Wars" defensive shield. Though
often depicted as a recluse, flamboyant nouveau-riche Tesla
(1856-1943) lived in Manhattan's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel for two
decades, and hobnobbed with architect Sanford White, Mark Twain,
Rudyard Kipling, conservationist John Muir, mogul John Jacob Astor
III, Swami Vivekananda. Yet the electronic wizard, who competed
fiercely with Marconi and with his one-time employer Edison, became
swamped in debt, abandoned by a world he helped create, ending his
days in seedy poverty, a bitter, anorexic eccentric obsessed with
feeding pigeons and avoiding germs. Seifer, who teaches psychology
at Community College of Rhode Island, attributes Tesla's downfall
partly to his megalomaniacal, neurotic, self-destructive
tendencies, partly to a quagmire of litigation and also to his
Faustian pact with his ambivalent benefactor, Wall Street financier
J. Pierpont Morgan, to whom he relinquished control of several
patents. Morgan, suggests Seifer, stymied Tesla's visionary scheme
for a global, wireless power-distribution system because, if
realized, it would jeopardize electrical, lighting and telephone
monopolies. Seifer provides the fullest account yet of Tesla as an
entrepreneur, experimental physicist and inventor.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. Boxed & Starred
Review
From Library Journal:
Nikola Tesla is credited by many as the inventor of radio and
should have received most of the credit for the development of
modern electricity. Yet there is considerable confusion about his
technical contributions and even more about his personal life. This
book, by a professor of psychology at Bristol Community College and
a member of the International Tesla Society, painstakingly
documents Tesla's wide-ranging contributions. Born in Croatia,
Tesla emigrated to the United States in 1884 and almost immediately
began work on alternatives to what was then accepted as standard
electrical technology. This brought him into conflict with Edison
and later Westinghouse. The pattern of conflict continued for
nearly 60 years, partially because Tesla was far ahead of his time,
partially because he was erratic and off-beat, and partially
because he was not an astute business partner. Seifer has analyzed
extensive sources, many not previously used by other Tesla
biographers, to provide a detailed interpretation of his life, but
the fact that he also incorporates extensive handwriting analysis
to arrive at several of his conclusions will certainly cause some
reader concern. For larger science and biography
collections.?Hilary Burton, Lawrence Livermore National Lab.,
Livermore, Cal.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --
From Booklist:
What kind of genius can fathom the mysteries of electromagnetism
but cannot keep corporate lawyers from taking him to the cleaners?
Perhaps because his life did not culminate in wealth and acclaim,
Nikola Tesla has largely slipped from the national memory. Seifer's
biography rescues him from oblivion, bringing back to life the
amazingly creative intellect that gave us fluorescent lighting,
wireless communication, cheap electrical power, and the remote
control. But Seifer also resurrects the wounded, self-destructive
personality who never recovered from the loss of a favored older
brother and who spiraled into weird obsessions, mental collapse,
and poverty as he watched other men use his inventions to win fame
and riches. Seifer does an admirable job of explaining his
subject's technical feats and analyzing his psychological
idiosyncrasies. Tinged with pathos, this meticulously researched
biography deserves attention from all who would understand the
human tragedies played out in the shadows of our neon culture.
Bryce Christensen --
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