Destroyer of Worlds - Frank Close *****

At first glance at the title you might assume that this book is another Oppenheimer biography - and of course he features - but it's far more. Frank Close starts with a large pre-bomb section taking us through the development of nuclear physics. Some aspects of this are familiar, such as Rutherford and the nucleus, others less so - it's great, for example, to have story of discovery of the neutron as it has rarely been covered and was a real scientific race, laden with misunderstanding and last minute experiments. 

There are a lot of names presented here and it would be easy to turn this into a tedious collection of who did what, but Close is skilful enough to make the telling of the story gripping, and brings in some less familiar characters, such as Majorana and Compton to season the familiar names. Close excels at digging out aspects of the history that were a little different from the way the stories are often told, for example casting doubt on the details of Szilard's alleged revelation of chain reactions while crossing the road into Russell Square in London.

The whole book could have been dedicated to the increasing knowledge of the nucleus and its potential for generating energy (Rutherford's famous quote 'Anyone who looks for a source of power in the transformation of atoms is talking moonshine' is also given a novel context), but Close brings in the details of both the initial fission bomb science and a considerable amount on the extension to fusion (H-bombs) both in the US and in Russia.

At one point I did raise an eyebrow - I don't know if it's because Close is an Oxford man to the core, but he does have a moment of architectural madness, first describing a Cambridge college’s courts as quadrangles (many, but not all. technically are, but it’s not what they are called), then apparently referring to the elegant stone entrance of the Cavendish Laboratory as 'a red brick building whose windows could have doubled for offices in a Northern mill town.' Admittedly there is a red brick building further down Free School Lane, but this wouldn't feature in the walk described and it is the engineering labs, not the Cavendish (also the brick building is handsome in its own right).

My only other slight moan is that the name of the book suggests an attempt to hitch onto the publicity arising from the Oppenheimer movie, given its status as an extract from Oppenheimer's famous quote from the Bhagavad Gita 'Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds' - but Oppenheimer himself only gets a few passing lines - and Close with typical verve adds in the comment of another watcher at the Los Alamos test '"Now we are all the sons of bitches," which more prosaically described what the scientists' achievement would make them.' Minimal reference to Oppenheimer is entirely legitimate for a book that concentrates on the science behind nuclear weapons (and power) rather than the organisational details of the Manhattan Project, which has been covered at length elsewhere - but it does feel a touch misleading.

An excellent combination of nuclear physics primer and history of the developing science of nuclear power and weapons through to the mid-sixties. One of his best yet.

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Review by Brian Clegg - See all Brian's online articles or subscribe to a weekly email free here