The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla - Biography of a Genius

Always been very interested in Mr. Tesla. To me, the most under-estimated and under-credited inventor of all time. He was very far ahead of his time and very misunderstood. I wish the people back then had been more accepting of his ideas. I was glad to have more knowledge of his life and personality after reading this book. The only flaw was that it sometimes jumped back and forth in time from one chapter to the next. I would have preferred a more chronological structure to the book.

A much for i depth look at Tesla and his life serving humanity. He was a mad many years ahead of his time and sought to free mankind through free energy. He is sadly omitted prom school textbooks when every American should know about him.

A good recount of Tesla's life, view on things, evolution of his ideas and the men he met along the way.

History repeats and erases some names in order to give credit, sometimes, to the wrong ones...

Excellent book. Well researched and well written. The author explores the many facets of the man, his psyche, personal relationships and philosophies. The reader gains a comprehensive understanding of the myth behind Tesla, his accomplishments and contributions, his future vision, and why he may have been his own worst enemy. A fascinating read.

This is so well written that my 9 year old is reading it and enjoying it immensely. Tesla was scientifically brilliant and so far ahead of his time and yet such a foolish man when it came to people and their motives. Had he been more savvy with the world of human nature around him things would have been quite different for him. He didn't have the conniving nature of Thomas Alva Edison, who was shameless in his stealing of others' inventions and claiming them as his own.

I think people can be savvy and not be creeps. Anyway, this book will really bring this amazing man to life and encourage a love of learning. We highly recommend it!

Not only does this book reveal the life and character of Tesla but it also covers much of the political and financial growth of our nation. The power plays of the past are just like the ones of today.

I had no idea what Nikola Tesla did until I heard about him on TV I decided to get a book and read about all his accomplishments... I still have no idea why I never heard of him before.... this was very interesting and informative !

Nikola Tesla didn't invent the car that bears his name, yet he either invented or improved on so many things we use in our everyday lives. The author has done a brilliant job in telling us about this genius who helped improve, not invent(as I once thought)the alternate (AC)electrical system. It's a long book. It is also enjoyable reading because the author did so much research about Tesla life, including his early years. Simply a marvelous, well written tale...very readable.

Really enjoyed the book but it was marred by spelling errors and poor grammar in the Kindle version. I was also somewhat disappointed to see Tesla's name misspelt in some chapters; perhaps the store should 'proof read' the electronic version before it gets released.

Nicola Tesla was a genius. I was in awe of what his mind produced. He was probably one of the greatest inventors who ever lived. However, this book will only be enjoyed by engineers and those who are interested in technical things. About 95% of the book is technical with only 5% about Tesla's personal life.

If you think that Edison invented electricity, think again! It's a fascinating bio of a genius. They may have mentioned Testa in school but he rarely received the recognition for his work that he deserved.

This very in-depth work truly explains the ins and outs of tesla, his groundbreaking work, struggles with his contemporary men of science, and in general the world as it existed during his time. A brilliant work for anyone seriously interested in tesla, this book displays a great technical understanding of everything tesla and other inventors of his time did.

I bought this book after watching Ancient Aliens on the History Channel. Aside from that, I think some people are so intelligent, that they can't be human, and are placed on earth to teach the human kind. May sound dumb to you but nevertheless I bought this book to see if they mentioned anything about any supernatural events in his life that would justify my belief. I read the book on my lunch hour and have only gotten into about the first 30 years of his life; when he was working for Edison. This book is very informative from the very beginning, presenting the facts of his life. It is easy reading and keeps me interested. This man truly was a genius.

It makes sense that this book was written in the fashion that best suited it. The author is a nephew of Nikola himself.

I found the book to be concise, and clear while providing a great look into the life of Tesla. Who, has since become an idol of mine.

If Edison had not stolen his pattons & lied to the rich patrons think of where we might be. Tesla had described a device that would gather ALL information & that you could communicate with. Doesn't that sound lick a cell phone or early computer? Instead He like Mozart died young & penniless

This book is an in-depth account of Tesla's life. It also lets us see the power of JP Morgan. For technical information other books provide more detail. Tesla failed because he was wrong. This book illustrates this fact well.

Sadly, I decided to purchase this book after reading a free kindle sample. I wish I had read the negative reviews before wasting my money.

One negative reviewer wrote: "...I would describe the technical portion of this book as a good joke..." Another reviewer wrote: "Unfortunately, the author sometimes discusses his own belief in ESP and other pseudoscience, which calls into question his overall credibility." After reading this book, I concur with both statements. In my view, the author doesn't understand enough about electromagnetism and electricity to attempt to evaluate Tesla's technical contributions.

The book's author, responding to another negative the store reviewer, wrote: "[the the store reviewer] obviously did not read the book, so how could he comment?...Concerning the structure of the book, it is a strict chronology, so his comment about it's [sic] organization is also absurd."

"It's organization" Get that? Normally I don't pick on such grammatical errors, but when an author promotes his own wanting work as "serious scholarship" (see below), I cannot resist.

In any event, it seems likely the author has not read his own book. If he had, he would have known that it contains misplaced paragraphs, as though they were cut and randomly pasted into the wrong section of a chapter. The book is disjointed at times, and in need of proofreading.

The author also defends his book here on the store by quotemining a printed review of his book with: "That is why Scientific American called the book 'Serious Scholarship.'"

However, if you take the time to find the full Scientific American review, you'll learn that the reviewer actually observed: "Yet underneath the layers of hero worship, uncritical acceptance of Tesla's pronouncements and some dubious technical claims, the core of Seifer's book is a serious piece of scholarship."

I'd spend time critiquing this book more constructively if I thought the author would ever attempt to write another scientific biography, or conduct the scholarship necessary to become scientifically competent enough to assess Tesla's achievements, claims, and promotions, but looking at the author's other works and interests, I doubt he will, so I won't waste my time.

Unless you want to learn interesting and scholarly tidbits about the 1893 Columbian exposition, or read adoring descriptions of pseudoscientific ideas of Tesla's contemporaries, complete with scholarly looking footnotes, skip the book.

If you're looking for a scientific biography on an inventor/scientist/engineer by an author who can present and evaluate Tesla's technical contributions in a scientific context, look elsewhere.

Wizard: The Life and Times of Nikola Tesla: Biography of a Genius does contain moments where Tesla, the man, shines through in all his strange genius, but more often he is buried under lists of achievements and lists of his competitors’ achievements. ‘Wizard’ is disorganized, and impersonal (until the very end) and for the layman (in terms of Tesla’s discoveries and controversies) oddly not super informative. There are several other biographies out there, including an autobiography and a biography by a Tesla contemporary, and I’d recommend one of them over this one. Marc Seifer uses Tesla’s autobiography gratuitously in the beginning, as it is likely the only source available for those years, and the excerpts used are entertaining as well as fascinating. We get a sense early from these quotations on Tesla’s flair for the dramatic, which then kind of fades from the limelight as the middle of the book turns into a list of patents, only to return as posterity catches up with the genius, thus capturing more of his antics for later researches to dig up. Tesla the man is a fascinating one. Part genius and part lunatic. A selective obsessive compulsive and ego maniac. A shut in and a show man. A science fiction writer that made things instead of wrote them. Perhaps the other bios fall into similar traps – with a lack of personal details available for large swaths of time, they result into piecing together a life via the inventions – but I found the ‘life’ much more interesting than the ‘times’ – at least in terms of how the times were presented here. However, J.P. Morgan, Edison, Hugo Gernsback, John Jacob Astor, Mark Twain, and many other well-known giants of the time make important appearances that of course, could never be left out. Ultimately, despite the flaws, Wizard won me over. I so enjoyed learning about the man who is now a household word. Perhaps I’d have been better served reading a different biography about him, and maybe I’ll do so down the line, but until then, I’m glad to have read this one.

Nikola Tesla is the genius whose understanding of the physics of electricity resulted in the technical breakthroughs that revolutionized our modern industrial society. These include industrial level generation and transmission of alternating current, fluorescent and neon lighting, and breakthroughs in wireless communications.

Sadly, as chronicled by author Marc Seifer, Tesla lacked commercial judgment and his iconoclastic personality resulted in needless battles with contemporary innovators such as Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, Charles Steinmetz, and Guglielmo Marconi. Initially he was backed by the most important banker of the age, J.P. Morgan, who became disillusioned with the inventor.

Early on, Tesla collaborated with George Westinghouse to light the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893 and received prominent billing for Westinghouse’s use of the “Tesla Polyphase System”. Along with Westinghouse, he also had a significant role in harnessing the power of Niagara Falls to generate electricity and transmit power to the city of Buffalo, New York. Thus in the 1890s Tesla was widely recognized for his technical genius.

But Edison, Westinghouse, and Marconi could bring promising technological inventions to fruition, which was Tesla’s key failure.

Seifer chronicles many such examples. Both J.P. Morgan and John Jacob Astor advanced the inventor money to bring into production his patented fluorescent and neon lighting systems to compete with Edison’s incandescent light bulb. But Tesla was always on to the next technical breakthrough without exploiting what breakthroughs he had already achieved. He diverted Morgan’s funds to developing wireless communications systems, particularly a costly and never completed transmission tower on Long Island. Naturally this made Morgan and Astor furious as Tesla chased new theories and failed to deliver a return on their investment for what he had already discovered.

In 1899 Tesla refused to compete for a lighthouse contract involving experimentation with wireless communications. By contrast, Marconi seized this opportunity and moved ahead with ship to shore and ship to ship communications. Although Marconi’s system was technologically inferior to that of Tesla (and Marconi later pirated a superior Tesla oscillator, according to Seifer), Marconi kept winning contracts, testing his wireless technology under practical conditions, and making incremental improvements that allowed him to dominate the technology. Edison took the same practical approach to the rollout and commercial success of his innovations.

Beginning in 1907 and into the 1930s, Tesla began to advance wilder and wilder theories and schemes, including communication with extraterrestrials, the belief that he could transmit messages at faster than the speed of light, and the assertion that he had developed a system of particle death beams. While making extravagant claims, Tesla showed a perpetual reticence about revealing the particulars of his “discoveries”.

At the end of his life, then Tesla seemed to have “a great mind gone astray” and to fit the profile of the quintessential mad scientist.

The weakness of this book is that it attempts too much, trying to compensate for the lack of recognition of Tesla’s contributions. Seifer’s thorough research, including review of original source documents, is to be applauded. This is particularly illuminating as it relates to Tesla’s relationship with J.P. Morgan and George Westinghouse. Thus the book should be read as a summary of Tesla’s life and times, as the title subhead suggests.

Many critics of the book fault the author’s technical interpretations. Seifer’s writing style is uneven and the organization of the book is a bit patchwork as the author tries to cover all the bases of technology, Tesla’s personality, and the commercial and social fabric of his time. Still, the reader comes away with an understanding both of Tesla’s genius and the all too human flaws which have prevented him from receiving the recognition of his better known contemporaries.

A good, in-depth view of one of the most misunderstood (and relatively unknown) minds of the last hundred years. At times this book is perhaps a bit TOO in-depth, as it spends much more time on the general history of the period than it does on Tesla himself. In this way, this book could have been trimmed by a couple hundred pages. The stories of Tesla's contemporaries and how they affected and were affected by him is definitely relevant, but I found myself wanting Seifer to get to the point on more than one occasion.

Nevertheless, this is bio is a notable achievement and well-done overall. Seifer manages to avoid hero-worship and paints a critical portrait of a man who was incredibly brilliant (Tesla virtually invented the wireless technology we all use to this day, as well as technologies we take for granted like florescent lighting, AC power, and remote control systems) but also naive and possibly delusional (he failed to capitalize on his inventions, was constantly in debt, and believed he was communicating with aliens on Mars).

Still, Tesla was the definitive "Man out of time" - a visionary and futurist who had, arguably, more impact on technology and science than any other figure of the late 19th and early 20th century. A good read if you can stick through it.

First, the Good News. After doing lots of delving for the best biography on Nikola Tesla, I settled on "Wizard:...". After reading it (& later many comments about other Tesla biographies), I think "Wizard" may actually be the best of the bunch.

Now, the Bad News. "Wizard" may actually be the best of the bunch.

The author clearly admires Tesla (as do I), so that is not in question. The problem with this book, & apparently with many other Tesla bios, is that the author doesn't achieve a satisfying balance of technical content (yes, I mean actual hard-core physical principles... which is not impossible even for a general readership) with insight into the person in question. And the various speculative conversations between Tesla & his contemporaries don't work well in the book.

Good writing is what I wanted and, given the many fascinating devices invented by Tesla, a more thoughtful selection of illustrations and pictures. Just check the Wikipedia article on Tesla to understand what I mean; you'll do better by reading the Wikipedia.

In short, if you're an electrical engineer or physicist, you'll be rather disappointed. If you're an intelligent (but non-technical) general reader, you'll find the writing style tedious & somewhat disorganized.

I am glad the author wrote this book, and wish him well. However, a definitive biography of Tesla is something we'll need to wait for.

There is a dominant theme in the life of Nikola Tesla. His undoubted genius. Tesla pioneered, if not invented; AC motors, AC power generation and transmission, high voltage generation (Tesla coil), wireless transmission of power and information, radio controlled boats, cold discharge fluorescent lighting, and the `death-ray'.

It also meant that he was ahead of his time, in many cases unable or disdainful to translate what to him was now obvious to those of lesser vision or ability. This resulted in tempestuous clashes with entrepreneurial inventors in three major technologies, technologies that defined this as the `Age of Electricity'. Tesla's was no ordinary progression in life and its colorful and quirky story continues to determine his eccentric place in history - from near invisibility to cult figure.

Two books: many stories

My prompt for this writing this essay was my recent reading of two books on Tesla's life. His autobiography; My Inventions and other writings, first published serially in 1919 when he was 63, is a technicolour, frenetic meditation on his major discoveries and innovations. It is autobiographical, mixing his life stories with his inventions, the narrative leaping around in time and place as Tesla seemed to in real life. Worth reading to obtain some of the character of Nikola Tesla - even if coloured by his own deliberate self mythologizing.

The second book Wizard: the life and times of Nikola Tesla (by Marc Seifer) captures much of the excitement of this early age of electricity. This book is a chronology of Tesla's life, informative in its research and illuminating with its vignettes drawn from contemporary memoirs. At the same time its chronological presentation provides a misleading sequential perception of his life.

Seifer also lacks the engineering or science competence to describe in simple terms the genius of Tesla's inventions. An essential for a biography of someone whose whole life revolved around his work. In the concluding chapters Seifer's writing starts to take on the ludicrous credulity of the conspiracy theorist - which is a pity the rest of the book is clear of this nonsense.

in defense of Seifer I think it would be challenge for any biographer to tell the whole Tesla story. Tesla was completely consumed by his ideas and inventions, eschewing most intimate contact - to the extreme of apparently being celibate his whole life. To make credible his fantastic life is a challenge. Furthermore, a modern reader, it most cases will struggle in comprehending the archaic technical descriptions and ideas.

The dawn of the Electric Age

This was an age when electricity and magnetism had only recently been linked by the arcane mathematics of James Clerk Maxwell and electricity was still thought to propagate by vibrations of an aether. Tesla was one of the few people alive who understood the physics of what we now call electromagnetism, and could also translate this into tangible inventions.

Tesla's name is associated with the invention of the rotating magnetic field and the ability of such a field to produce an electric current. By 1882 Tesla had invented and patented the AC polyphase motor - giving the ability to transfer electrical energy into mechanical energy. The reverse of this creates a turbine that converts mechanical energy, from say a waterfall, into electrical energy.

Tesla's move, in 1884, from Europe to the USA was to develop his own inventions and contribute to Edison's commercial interests. This collaboration parted ways over what became the AC-DC power war. Edison's commercial interests were firmly focused on his incandescent lamps and the use of DC power (direct current; such as we get from a battery). Tesla had correctly intuited from first principles that alternating current (AC power as we now operate our homes and industries on), as different to DC power, could be transported by wires over great distances with minimal power loss.

Ultimately Tesla was proved both scientifically and commercially correct. It was his turbine designs that Westinghouse used in the first major hydroelectric power station in the world - the 1894 powering of Buffalo by the might of Niagara falls.

This was a tumultuous period of commercial expansion. The ability to power industry by electricity rather than steam was arguably a bigger leap than from manual to steam power - certainly in commercial terms. The ensuing law-suits and counter-suits over patent precedence in motors, generation and transmission, roiled across the US and Europe, making and breaking reputations and fortunes. These actions bringing Edison General Electric to its knees and forcing it to join with others to become General Electric.

Westinghouse prevailed, at the same time neglecting to pay Tesla royalties that he deserved - despite he not bothering to ensure he had written agreements. This disdain for the corporate conventions of the time cost Tesla both wealth and reputation. He moved onto other new ideas whilst others claimed his inventions in the law and popular press.

Father of the wireless

This was repeated in the next huge modernisation trend - the invention of the wireless transmission of information. By 1893 Tesla was demonstrating the transmission of electric power by wireless means most notably at the Chicago World fair. He delighted in amazing audiences with fantastic high-voltage discharge displays, passing millions of volts through his body and remote lighting of fluorescent tubes by radio frequency.

Already in 1891 he had discussed his "wireless telegraphy" and demonstrated the technology required in 1892. It was 1894 before Guglielmo Marconi would begin his teenage tinkering in the wireless field. So why do we remember the name of Marconi as synonymous with radio? Why did he share the 1909 Nobel Prize with Karl Braun rather than with Tesla?

It would appear from historical evidence that Tesla, in his own mind, had already proved it - and moved on. Whereas the entrepreneur in Marconi, much like Edison, was tenacious in development of his inventions. Tesla at this time had formed a company with the financier Pierpont Morgan to commercialise his wireless technologies. Morgan knew their was a fortune in wireless telegraphy and fluorescent lighting; provided they were developed sufficiently to present to investors as near commercial realities.

To this end Morgan had tasked him with demonstrating the fluorescent light technologies and maturing their manufacture and demonstrating his wireless by covering off-shore yacht races. The latter would have been a tangible demonstration for both the rich and the Navy. Tesla did neither. he scorned the triviality of the public demonstration - despite his very public earlier electric demonstrations. This left the field of wireless telegraphy (radio) for Marconi and other to develop. instead Tesla squandered the Morgan money on his other big dream - providing wireless transmission of electric power by radio.

Radio power, transmission and weapons

Tesla's greatest dream was sure to be one not funded by the likes of Morgan. He envisaged a world where power and information were transmitted world-wide - for free. To this end he he used the money from Morgan to plan and start building a gigantic transmission tower, Wardenclyffe, in 1902. His philanthropic ideals and profligate spending meant that by 1906 his funding from Morgan had dried up, and his dream never realised. The tower was destroyed in 1917 by US Government orders to ensure that it was not used by enemies of the state.

In developing this idea he correctly understood the physics of wireless transmission both through the atmosphere and the ground. Laying down the principles that would guide the subsequent invention of both AM and FM radio.

A combination of creditors, stock market upheavals, World War 1 and the stock market collapse of 1930 ensured that Tesla could never raise the money required to bring about this revolutionary idea. A idea revolutionary even by the social standards and upheavals of the time.

At the same time Tesla was a continuing fountain of new ideas. Perhaps given the turbulent times these included the world's first radio controlled boat in 1898 which he continually and unsuccessfully tried to interest the US Navy in, improvements on dirigibles, a helicopter plane called a flivver and at the age of 78 a `death-ray'.

This latter `invention' was never built nor even prototyped but harked back to experiments of Tesla in the 1890′s that were only a small step away from the invention of the laser. The ideas were sufficiently developed though to serve as mental prototypes for particle-beam weapons and strategic defense shields loved by science fiction writers and some politicians.

Modern nonsense

Apart from the tangible technological legacies left by Tesla's prodigious genius there are also quixotically hare-brained modern legacies. These Tesla, if he were alive today, would scoff at. None more so than the Tesla "free-energy-generator"

This modern scam is based on the misrepresentation of Tesla's laudable Wardenclyffe dream and his idea that you could use his generator as a receiver of the, at the time, newly discovered cosmic rays. The radio sophistication and development of radar during and subsequent to WW11 demonstrate the impracticality of large transmitters and receivers of radio power at the levels envisaged by Tesla. We now use networks of smaller powered repeaters (many of these satellites) to ensure uninterrupted radio/telephone/television coverage on a world-wide basis. As for cosmic rays, they are energetic, however of such low density (thankfully for life) that collecting sufficient power from them is impracticable.

That scams based on Tesla exist in this modern age is testament not to conspiracy theories as maintained by these swindlers. Rather it is testimony to Tesla being truly ahead of his time - a time of tumultuous technological growth, which he partially created without ever seeming to inhabit.

A complete biography of Nikola Tesla is still to be written. I believe it will require a writer who understands the science and engineering of Tesla's age and who has the artistry to weave the many threads of his life into the dynamic, parallel genius of his life - teetering on the precipice of chaos - that was Nikola Tesla.

This article was first published on Australian Science and republublished on dragonlaughing

Seifer expresses that the key reason he wrote Wizard was to try and answer many of the questions left unanswered by the other authors. In particular he focuses in on why Tesla's name dropped into obscurity, whether or not he really received signals from Mars, how his magnifying transmitter really worked, what exactly happened to cause his failure with JP Morgan,what happened to his top secret papers and also the book explains exactly how his particle beam weapon have really worked.

One of the book's strengths is that it is set up completely

chronologically. Thus you can cue into any year and oftentimes particular months of Tesla's life. Every chapter also begins with a neat quote. I turned to the back and counted over 1400 endnotes including 400 personal letters. This is the real deal, much of it in Tesla's actual words.

One of the neatest sections was a discussion of of how Tesla's

early lectures in the 1890's pre-dated Rutherford, Bohr and Einstein in theories on the structure of the atom and on what came to be called Quantum physics. Jumping ahead 20 years, Seifer reveals that during WWI, Franklin Roosevelt, as Secretary of the Navy, used Tesla's priority patents in wireless to combat Marconi's contention that the Navy was stealing Marconi's

invention.

Seifer goes on to show that Tesla was selling wireless technology to the Germans during WWI and that this apparatus was used to coordinate submarine movements at that time. Later, during WWII, Tesla also apparently worked with the US war department to give them the invention of the particle beam

weapon.

The focus of the book, however, is Wardenclyffe, Tesla's world wireless communication system that was backed by JP Morgan, who at the time, was the most powerful man on the planet. Every other biography that I read on Tesla leaves it as a mystery as to why Morgan pulled funding of this venture. Seifer paints almost a day by day account of the partnership, explains

exactly what happens, and backs his findings with something like 40 letters between Tesla and Morgan. The story is dynamite, because had Tesla succeeded in harnessing the enterprise, we would have had wireless and cellular technology by 1905 instead of 20 to 90 years later.

This has to be one of the most amazing books I have ever read. I didn't just learn about Tesla, but also about the rise of corporate America, the role of technology in shaping social events and about many of Tesla's friends, enemies and colleagues like Tom Edison, Guglielmo Marconi, JP Morgan, Stanford White, John Jacob Astor and Franklin Roosevelt. But what sets this book apart is how well all this information is conveyed in narrative form. This is a biography, mystery, and electrical engineering book all in one. Very entertaining.

Nikola Tesla is an amazing person whose genius, ingenuity and work ethic impacted the world more than many other recognized (so-called) geniuses. It is a travesty of history that he is not better recognized for his accomplishments. I believe this book is an excellent attempt at giving this recognition.

First, it should be remembered that this is not a physics text nor an expository of Tesla's scientific observations. Although it does cover his scientific theories and progress, it does so only to illustrate the growth of the person; it is there to provide contextualization of a life devoted to scientific progress.

Secondly, this work is a biography; it is well-written, providing insights and thoughts into a life of a genius; we can only guess, through extrapolation, at what Tesla's life must have been like in an era so far away. It could be argued that this era is, historically speaking, not too far from our own; yet, that argument falls short from the true explanation. I am well-traveled and have met people in several different countries who do not understand a culture that is a significant geographical distance from their own. That is for extant cultures! How much more could we not understand a society and culture over 100 years gone? Perhaps that is the reason the author provides personal anecdotes; or, perhaps not, regardless, the anecdotes and personal references add a wonderful flavor to descriptive text.

I highly recommend this book for those Tesla fanatics who put the "-atics" in "fanatics." It is a well-thought out biography of a man who is so great that we have yet to catch up to his scientific worldview over a century later, despite history's attempts to 'forget', arguably, the most intelligent human who has ever lived. That is why I use the present tense to refer to Tesla: his contributions to our world are present everywhere; as such, he, like few others in history, has achieved a certain kind of immortality, which is captured beautifully in Seifer's work.

Seifer's comprehensive look at Nikola Tesla is unexpected. It is neither dry, formulaic or predictable - even for those familiar with the enigmatic genius. Simply put, it is fascinating, exciting reading. Tesla was credited with the invention of modern AC power generation, remote control, fundamental advances in radio, wireless voice- and data-transfer, the first laser, advanced flight concepts, and a myriad of other inventions. Yet he died without ever achieving the financial rewards one would expect for a man who was truly ahead of his time.
Taking advantage of ill-defined intellectual property laws and the vagaries of international court systems, other well-known inventors such as Pupin, Marconi, and Steinmetz either "borrowed" his discoveries or helped write him out of the history books. While many rode Tesla's coattails to public recognition and, often, staggering financial success - the great man was left penniless and alone.
Seifer pulls no punches. Tesla made a series of startling gaffes. From ill-conceived contracts with Westinghouse (leaving him with no ongoing revenue from his discovery of the AC polyphase system) to poor management of critical projects backed by J.P. Morgan, Tesla disappointed his financiers time and time again. Lack of prioritization, spinning off in too many directions simultaneously, poor project management - all contributed to Tesla's inability to achieve the breakthrough he needed (and deserved) for true financial independence.
Seifer covers Tesla's life in exceptional detail. His bizarre work habits (often sleeping only two hours a night), his odd social life (never married and apparently a lifelong celibate), and his many other idiosyncrasies are described with fascinating anecdotes. You don't need to be an Electrical Engineer, or a Scientist, or even technically savvy to thoroughly enjoy _Wizard_. In a nutshell: superb.

Does this book deserve another review as the best book yet written on Tesla? Well, yes it does. Gauss virtually invented modern mathematics through visionary experiences in his early years. Some have said modern mathematics is just the reinvention of what Gauss forgot to write down. When we turn on the light switch we invoke a complex system of electronics virtually all of which was invented by Tesla in his early years and that was just the part he wrote down and people copied. The most interesting stuff has been buried by commercial and government interests and has yet to see the light of day. Some of it is still viewed as science fiction by professors of electrical engineering who should know better. Well, the book was given to me by an inventor as a favor for using a derivative of Tesla's work to help him with a very practical problem. So in return I salute all inventors, particularly Tesla who may be the greatest of them all.

Nicola Tesla is arguably the most important scientist/engineer of the twentieth century. Tesla did not get most of the credit that was his due. He ought to have died a wealthy man but he died an impoverished man. This brilliant man forfeited profits from the AC motor which he designed because if George Westinghouse had fulfilled the contract he had made with Tesla, Westinghouse would have gone bankrupt. So Tesla, in an act of admirable selflessness, tore up his contract. Westinghouse eventually became quite wealthy, but incredibly, he selfishly never made up the loss to Tesla. Marconi got credit for developing the telegraph, when credit for the telegraph should actually have gone to Nicola Tesla. This book is written by a relative of Tesla's, (The intro was written by a Tesla relative. The author corrected this reviewer statement in a comment on this review.) This book is a fascinating look into the life of Nicola Tesla.

I loved your quintessential work on Tesla. Wizard not only covered every topic in his life, it also is grounded in science so much that I had to review Maxwell's equations. Most of all it was steeped in honest history, from Croatia to America this book tells the truth. In my opinion you have not read a biography on Tesla unless it was Wizard.

A review of a comprehensive biography of a forgotten geniuses whose name should be on the lips of every child who lives with a cell phone permanently attached to their fingers. Nikola Tesla, who grew up dreaming of changing the world, attempted to do just that every time he was told he could not do something. Overshadowed in history by the likes of Marconi and Edison; Tesla deserves as much credit and more as this book lays out. Be prepared for a bit of conspiracy theory toward the tail end on the unanswered question if Tesla created a super weapon that the United States is still working on in secret.

Unfortunately, Tesla, as a fatally flawed hero during the dawn of electricity, lived further in the clouds than on the ground and thus is easily forgotten for inventing some of the greatest technologies we treasure today. This story is highly worth a read by all who have ever used a car radio or cell phone transmitter. Be advised there are complex concepts that challenge those not schooled in advanced physics, but if you so desire those occasional parts can be skipped with no detracting to the wonderful story of a flawed genius that lies within.

Full review at: [...]

I value this book highly because of its even-handedness in its treatment of Nikola Tesla. Virtually every thing stated by Mr. Seifer is documented. After all, this book is the result of his doctoral dissertation.

The subject of the book is treated as a believeable human being. Assuredly, he was a genius; but the author fairly points out when Tesla may have missed the mark. The author neither blindly worships nor blindly condemns Nikola Tesla.

Because this is a biography, it does not go into depth about Nikola Tesla's inventions; Enough information is presented as is necessary to the story.

I am thankful that I have encountered this book because it is based upon truth.

Marc did great job covering life and work of Nikola Tesla, a serbian-american inventor who made great contributions to modern science and engineering. Book covers all of the important aspects of Tesla's inventions and scientific discoveries. It covers the broader historical background and explains the importance of Tesla's work to a great detail. It is also very good at explaining "mysteries" surrounding Tesla's personal life. It presents Tesla both as one of the greatest scientist ever as well as a human being. This book is so good since it makes the right balance between technical information (very accurate, with rich bibliography) and Tesla's personal life and social interactions. Therefore it is interesting for both serious scientists who would like to learn from Tesla's work as well as for general population who would like to learn about this extraordinary personality.
Overall, this is the number one book on Tesla so far. The best starting point and reference regarding Tesla's life and work.

In my opinion this was a very good book about Tesla, but I must confess, I have not read any other biographies on him so I have nothing to compare it to. As others have stated, the book has lots of details about Tesla's personal life and his relationships with business associates like J.P. Morgan, Westinghouse, Edison, etc. Tesla was the primary architect of the twentieth century and yet he's practically been erased from the history books and the curriculums in the academic institutions. What does that tell you about the true purpose of "education" in this day and age (read the works of John Taylor Gatto, "Dumbing Us Down" and "The Underground History of American Education")?

Tesla was clearly a genius and anyone who says otherwise knows nothing about his accomplishments. Titans like J.P. Morgan became concerned about Tesla's intentions regarding the use of his wireless power transmisson, and other inventions. These corporate puppet masters don't want anything in the marketplace that they cannot wield complete control over. Free, wireless power transmission fell into this category. Tesla wanted to elevate humanity with his inventions, whereas Morgan (and others) wanted to gain greater control over humanity through technology. This is the same plight we are in today, in 2008, a hundred years later.

Tesla's work was by no means the only target for suppression. Those of you fascinated with Tesla will surely be fascinated with the discoveries of Albert Roy Davis and Walter C. Rawls, Jr. Tesla's emphasis was on electricity, while Davis and Rawls' was/is on magnetism. They state in their books that "magnetism is the father of electricity, rather than the child." Davis was the first scientist in the world to discover, in 1936, that magnetism consists of two separate and distinct energies, not one as it is still taught in colleges to this day (72 years later). Each pole has the opposite effect on all matter. Here's a quote from "The Magnetic Blueprint of Life". "Magnetism has been relegated to an inferior position in relation to electricity and gravity. As long as this concept exists in the scientific community, there will be only theories on theories, confusion on confusion." Doesn't that sum up today's physics pretty well? Physicists are working on the wrong principles and fundamentals of magnetism, and magnetism is the foundation of physics.

I very highly recommend reading the books by Davis and Rawls titled, "Magnetism and Its Effects on the Living System" (their first book), and "The Magnetic Blueprint of Life" (their fourth book). You can find a new copy of the latter book on the Albert Roy Davis Research Lab website (only used copies are available on the store). All of their books are great reading, but those two are the most technical and will likely interest Tesla fans the most. And don't let the titles of the books fool you, these books present detailed, reproducible facts about magnetism which prove that the principles and concepts of magnetism currently taught are wrong, and you won't find this information elsewhere. Many people are still unaware of their revolutionary discoveries and inventions. You will definitely want to read the article written by Walter Rawls titled, "The Scope of Biomagnetism", on the Teslatech website too. It will blow you away!

I've been told by a credible source that Tesla was almost certainly involved in the Philedelphia Experiment and that he left it because he knew there were going to be problems. He was also working for RCA laboratories at the time of his death, not just feeding pigeons on a bench waiting for the big sleep.

Many people consider Nikola Tesla to be the greatest inventor of the modern age. I am not here to debate if he was greater than Edison. They were both great men, and in fact, as Dr. Seifer shows, they were also respectful competitors, with Tesla accepting the Edison Medal in 1917 as a measure of their complex relationship. You can look over the introduction above for a litany of Tesla's many achievements. But Tesla for me is more than just a great inventor; he was also concerned about the environment, humanity and world unity. Tesla's closest friends included Robert Underwood Johnson, editor of The Century Magazine the great poet and mountain man, John Muir, and Teddy Roosevelt who Muir brought to Yosemite to create that magnificent park and found, as a trio, the Sierra Club. Tesla's invention of our hydroelectric power system, since it is non-polluting and renewable, is the single most important technological achievement for slowing down global warming, because it replaced Edison's coal-operated air-polluting DC generators. Tesla worked with Stanford White, considered by many to be the greatest architect of the day whose magnificent buildings are still today some of the finest ever built in America, and Tesla formed a partnership with J. Pierpont Morgan, the most important financier of the 20th century. Yes, Morgan ultimately failed in supporting Tesla, but Seifer explains in detail this amazing relationship, a battle for the soul of the planet, wires or wireless, with Morgan, unfortunately in the short run, the winner. Tesla is credited as the spiritual father of the internet, his quote from 1904 about converting the entire planet into "a virtual brain as it were, able to feel in all its parts," certainly recognizes this extraordinary late 20th century hi-tech development. I have met Dr. Seifer on several occasions, and in fact sponsored him to appear as the keynote speaker to the 2005 annual meeting of the Professional Engineers of Ontario. Not only did Dr. Seifer present Tesla's life story in a cogent fashion, that is, explain his excellent book, he also did it to a standing only crowd with a riveting slide presentation. If you are looking for one book about one extraordinary transformational individual whose life and achievements have inspired so many, I highly recommend Wizard: The Life & Times of Nikola Tesla. It's a book to read and also give your children and friends.

Full of distorted opinions and biased nationalism and very vague book. Definitely not worth the time of an Electrical Engineer. Perhaps some social student can look into the mindset of author while presenting the book.

I read through most of the reviews of this book, and find them, for the most part, dead on.

I did not buy it via the store (the horror!), but actually went to a bookstore looking for a book on Nikola Tesla, wanting to learn more about the fascinating individual.

After going through about 10 books by different authors, what made me choose this one was the sheer number of references the author used, including face to face interviews with people who knew Tesla.

The author uses a distinct timeline, which is a change from the other books I observed (such as Cheney's book), and also only used corroborative sources for his details, such as personal notes from Tesla, coorespondence, and so on.

If you are looking for a book on detailed explainations on his experiments, this is not the book for you. It is a highly detailed, personalized look at the man's life, mainly how someone so influential could be erased from common knowledge of history so effectively.

If you want details on his experiments, I recommend the book "The Fanastic Inventions of Nikola Tesla" : The Fantastic Inventions of Nikola Tesla (The Lost Science Series)

As a side note, I checked out the reviewers who gave this book one star and disparaged it. They tend to have only written one star reviews for everything. Don't let the one stars discourage you from reading this book and separating the myth from history.

Having read several books on Tesla, I found this the most fascinating. The meticulous research, combined with insight in filling in the gaps of the research, put together what is probably the most accurate story of Tesla and his dealings. The cast of supporting characters is a "Who's who" of American history, and it's all real. No fictionalized encounters or make believe dialouge. I can't understand the massive oversight of Hollywood, to a story far bigger and vastly more influential on our century than the Titanic ever could be. I would love to write a screenplay for Tesla, but I know Mr. Seifer has already done it. Being an engineer, I found Mr. Seifers technical presentation much more satisfying than the fictional hype of other Tesla books.

The book was a nice overview of Tesla's life and accomplishments and painted an interesting portrait of the inventor, but was unfortunately riddled with the authors own pseudo-scientific views. The book would have been substantially strengthened if he had focused on Teslas actual accomplishments rather than hypothesizing about his ability to read minds & other bits of new age babble. I'd recommend picking another book if you're interested in the inventor.

Without a doubt the most comprehensive book I have read on Mr. Tesla's life. This edition is meant for that reader who wants very detailed events and accomplishments about the scientist life. Mr. Seifer's research about Nikola Tesla's early life, his early school years, formal education and subsequent acquaintances establishes an overall base on which the reader can reference easily as the book progresses into Mr. Tesla's later years. The author brings to the reader's mind the fact that Nikola Tesla called his "close friends" the most amazing scientists at the turn of the 19th century who themselves became icons in the scientific community. However, Mr.Seifer, illustrates as well the human side of Nikola Tesla thereby keeping in focus the frail aspect of this incredible scientist and those devils his amazing intellect had to fight. I strongly recommend this book to those who wish to literaly know about Nikola Tesla's life. It is truly a manificent tome.

As you'd expect from a psychology professor, this biography is an extremely good biography of Tesla as a person, and a very good biography of his life and times. As with most scientific prodigies, the biographers are not equal to their subjects' scientific accomplishments, which leads to a certain amount of benign neglect. The book would not suffer under a few more historical mises en scène. All in all though, it is an extremely good book.

Bravo, Bravo.
What a great find. I have been through this book twice and still find myself overwhelmend by the accomplishments of Tesla. The Author was detailed and objective in his writing. Considering the family ties he writes about. What I especially found interesting is the later chapters, addressing the so called occult theory's about Tesla and his works. For the most part, he laid them to rest. Again Bravo! However I am a bit disapointed that there wasn't more on his Invention's and Patent's. I was hoping for a detailed list or drawings on his invetion's. Still, the pictures and accounts of his life, is one of the best I have seen. Over all a must to read.

Marc Seifer provides a vivid and intimate look into the life of one of history's most influential inventors, Nikola Tesla. Tesla's discoveries have led to various innovations like the radio, telephone, and remote control vehicles. He led a very illustrious and eccentric life. Through out his career, he faced a lot of adversity and criticism from his rivals, who were trying to undermine his achievements. However, he never gave up or succumbed to the animosity. Instead, he persevered to regain his success and popularity until the end of his life.

Seifer recants Tesla's epic journey from an obscure town in Croatia to living in glamorous hotels and mingling with the social elite in New York City. He tells Tesla's story by dividing it into yearly intervals, which provides for a more organized and explicit look into his life and career. Also, his use of original documents and quotes from Tesla and other inventors makes the book more gripping and enhances its novelty. Although at times, Seifer may go into too much detail and makes the novel a bit boring, he still manages to tell a very compelling and powerful story.

In my opinion, Seifer wrote this novel in order to impart to the world the story of Nikola Tesla. Tesla is one of the most overlooked and underrated inventors in history but had an enormous impact in shaping modern technology. Seifer wants the world to know the life story one of history's most prolific and influential inventors, and through his book he is able to achieve this goal.

People should read this novel because Tesla is one of the world's most important inventors. It is a really interesting novel because there is so much history associated with Tesla's life. However, if you are not interested in physics or the development of modern technology, then I do not recommend this novel. Also, if you are not interested in biographies, you would only find this novel very boring and painful to read. In the end, I think that this is a very well written and informative book. You should definitely look into it if you like physics, electricity, or history.

If anyone has ever been interested in a the fascinating inventions of Tesla, this book will satisfy this interest and do so much more. It tells of his intellectual genius, and egotistical and financial failings. Tesla was his best and worst enemy, and this book does a nice job of proving both points. A really interesting read, with no slow parts as you might think. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

My opinion is that this booksheds much light on the oft-passed-over mysteries of the life and times of Tesla. No doubt his genius altered human history. I enjoyed Cheneys book perhaps more, but I learned more with the Seifer book. Seifer is maybe just a slight bit critical in a spot or two, but Cheney was overpoweringly non-critical.

Before I completed the third chapter, the binding began to release pages. Not just in chunks, but many pages individually. I am careful with books, and my library houses many titles from the mid 1800's, in good condition and in my possesion for all my life. When I buy a book, I sign my name in the front and plan to keep the good ones until I die. I was very disappointed that this book was so poorly constructed to fall apart as if it were disposable.

5 stars to Seifer
2 stars to Citadel Press

DC

The research that has gone into this book is exceptional. The author can almost tell you what Tesla had for lunch on any given day of his life! An extraordinary record of an extraordinary man who was light years ahead of his time and head and shoulders, morally and spiritually, above the parade of cheats and thieves he was unfortunate enough to come into contact with. The fact that they benefitted from his work meant that the rest of the world didn't and that has set us back decades if not centuries. A great story, well told.

While full of great detail about Tesla's life (much more than I was interested in hearing about; I feel that much of this could have been distilled without losing much), it is clear that the author has little technical understanding of the issues he discusses. There are numerous errors of fact regarding science and engineering, and no critical evaluation of which of Tesla's ideas were valid and which ones weren't. For the most part, the author thinks that everything Tesla did was valid and simply was not understood by the rest of the world. He even goes as far as attributing current technology to Tesla (e.g., particle beam weapons) only based on some superficial commonality to something Tesla described (there is a long section at the end implying that the secrets of his death ray were stolen and used by the USSR for what are still secret weapons).

Given this highly misleading impression of Tesla's technical contributions, I can't recommend this book at all.

(I listened to the audio version of the book)

I was hoping this book would have delved into Tesla's inventions more thoroughly. I was very disappointed in this aspect of the book. The author totally glossed over the Niagara Falls project, which was a major part of Tesla's contribution to electrical distribution. The book spends too much time on Tesla's failed business dealings and with all the secondary people that he seemingly had contact with throughout his life. The organization of the book also is disconcerting at times. You finish one paragraph and then the next paragraph is about a completely different subject, person, topic, etc. with absolutely no transition or introduction.

I expected more from this book. I feel I still don't know who Tesla was or what exactly his inventions were and for a project that took 20 years of the author's life, it is still lacking in important details.

Seifer did a comprehensive job of documenting Tesla's life but failed in appraising the contributions he made to science. From an engineers point of view, I feel that Seifer either did not have the technical knowledge to judge Tesla's endeavors or he was determined to undertake a crusade to make a scientific saint out him and ignored Tesla's follies.
Tesla did make significant advancements in alternating current machinery and in his work with coils and oscillators. But Tesla's concepts on the propagation of electromagnetic waves, as well as Seifer's interpretation was greatly lacking. Tesla believed that electromagnetic waves traveled as compression waves through the ether. Seifer, on page 102 refers to the 1881 Michelson and Morely experiments as "unsuccessfully tried to measure the ether..." Those experiments proved that, as far as electromagnetic propagation is concerned, there is no ether. Tesla claimed that he could communicate throughout the whole world from one location and went through hundreds of thousands of dollars in attempts to develop this. All one has to do is to look atTesla's Wardenclyffe tower as described and shown in the book to realize that if Tesla were the only one working on wireless communication we might not even have it today. On page 475, Seifer tells of a coil "50 miles in length or one forth the wavelength of light ...." The wave length of light is less than one millionth of a meter. The book describes many other concepts that Tesla raised money for but never brought to fruition. Tesla, as described in the book, was a showman and, perhaps a con artists promising his investors, such as Astor and Morgan, large returns but never accomplishing anything of merit for them. Tesla and Seifer seemed to believe that there was conspiracy against him and used that as an excuse for his lack of success in any of his endeavors after his original contributions to AC machinery.
The author, Seifer, attempts to credit Tesla's half baked concepts to everything we have today from communications to guided missiles, vertical take off airplanes, space defense, plus many other things. Unfortunately, many who read this book with a lack of technical knowledge may believe this. Tesla did contribute to alternating current technology but he was far from the genius Seifer tried to make of him.

This book's strongest suit is its history of Tesla's business dealings, and his meetings with other famous individuals of his era. The author obviously conducted a great deal of research. On the other hand, I found myself wishing for a clearer explanation of which of Tesla's ideas were clearly scientific advances, and which were fantasy or unworkable. Unfortunately, the author sometimes discusses his own belief in ESP and other pseudoscience, which calls into question his overall credibility.

I bought this book looking for a lay explanation of Tesla's electrical genius. He invented the polyphase motor or polyphase AC - the book isn't clear. And that's the point. The author does not discuss the very basic question of what polyphase is, why it's better, and what it was used for, other than lighting. It goes through the day-to-day of Tesla's life all right, but doesn't get into the genius as to his inventions. There is almost no practical explanation of his inventions whatsoever.

I wasn't looking for a doctorate level discussion of electricity. I just wanted an explanation of Tesla's inventions - his motors and current transmission systems. There is nothing like that anywhere in the book.

The cover of the book proclaims that it was Highly Recommended by the American Academy for the Advancement of Science. What a joke - there is no science in this book! The Academy ought to be shut down for having recommended this stinker.

In a word, the book sucks. Don't buy it.

This is by all means the worst book on Nikola Tesla ever! This book portrays Tesla in a way that he never was, a confused lunatic with confused visions and a hard line nationalist attitude. It is no wonder that one reader nicknamed huh concluded that Tesla was stupid and was not able to finish most of his inventions (by the way, this guy sounds like someone from Edison's camp). Tesla was born in an environment of constant clashes between Croats and Serbs, and Ottoman empire (not "Asian barbarians" as this author constantly portrays this great Empire) had nothing to do with Tesla's departure to US. Teslas's father was orthodox priest (a hardliner) who wanted to see his son in the Serbian army (it is the same army who completely escaped into Greece which is unknown example of cowardice in the history and whose king also escaped to England leaving his nation to German mercy, thus Tesla did not see anything great in this "great army"). Tesla refused going to Serbian army and he refused being hard-line nationalist. Tesla once said:" I am proud of my country Croatia and my Serbian nationality". This indicates best that he was not hard-line nationalist (keep in mind that Serbian nationalist even today claim that Croatia is occupied Serbian territory and that it will be wiped off the map). This author actually invented many stories of Tesla's life and even more of them are from second or third hand, totally untrue.

On the technical aspect of this book it is not even worth any comments. Someone who does not know anything about electrical tech must be wondering, what the heck did this guy Tesla invent anyway (hence huh reader again)? I would describe the technical portion of this book as a good joke; even Mr. Bean would do it better. Author just could not sustain a certain hatred for Ottoman empire, which by the way was not much different then eg. Roman empire. Stay away from this book, you will not learn anything from it and could be infected with serious hate.

This book is a zero mark!

The book lost me in the first sentence when it described Tesla as "credited by many as the inspiration for radio." What?! Tesla invented radio and won a Nobel Peace Prize for his accomplishment! How did he only inspire a later invention? It is true that Moroni originally won the Prize for inventing radio. But once the Prize committee's error was validated, Tesla was credited. Anyhow, supposedly this book is an observation on Tesla as a person. Yes, he was very eccentric, but no study on him as a person can be near completion without an analysis on his inventions and work. He was smarter than Einstein, so smart that many of his working theories can not be repeated with modern technology. I won't read this book. It lost me with its description and reviews. But everyone should study Tesla's contributions to our world and science.

After finishing this book I have decided to throw it in the trash and find a better reference with which to try to learn if Tesla was a "genius". The first book I have ever felt deserved such an honor. The information presented in the book is totally lacking in any technical detail with which one can determine if this guy Tesla was as stupid as it seems. Granted he may have started off strong with his AC motor inventions-as presented in the bok the rest seems like it was hocum-a conclusion that is based on Teslas apparent inability to finish any working models of his subsequent "inventions" as well as to get anybody to commit any money to their developement.

Was very much interested in Tesla and electricity instead I got a full load of self aggrandizement of the author and his chauvinist = should I say racist ideas ( ... talking about `the middle ages and hordes from Asia fighting the Serbs`) Sorry no interest in the person of this author and his logorrhoe!