ALAN LIGHTMAN

"A scientist who is a humanist in the noblest sense of the word." That's what The Los Angeles Times calls bestselling author Alan Lightman, one of a select group of thinkers whose work has successfully and elegantly bridged the gap between the worlds of science and art.

A theoretical physicist and a writer, Alan Lightman's novels include The Diagnosis, a finalist for the National Book Award, and the international bestseller Einstein's Dreams, which has become one of the most widely read books on college campuses. Salman Rushdie calls it "at once intellectually provocative and touching and comic and so very beautifully written." Lightman's much-anticipated new novel, Ghost, explores the delicate divide between the physical world and the spiritual world.

Praised by The New York Times as "a scientist in love with words, one who can write clearly and appealingly about his subject for a lay readership," Lightman is widely considered one of the great scientific interpreters of his generation. His acclaimed non-fiction books include A Sense of the Mysterious and The Discoveries: Great Breakthroughs in 20th Century Science, Including the Original Papers. His essays have appeared in Nature, The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker and top scientific journals.

Lightman has served on the faculties of Harvard, where he taught physics and astronomy, and MIT, where he was one of the first people to receive a dual faculty appointment, in science and in the humanities. He has been recognized for his writings by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, where he is a Fellow, and has twice been a juror for The Pulitzer Prize, in the fiction and non-fiction categories.