Adventures in the Atomic Age by Glenn Seaborg, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, $27, ISBN 0374177155
GLENN Seaborg’s autobiography reveals the classic American success story. The son of Swedish immigrants, he financed himself through university by taking menial jobs after discovering a consuming interest in chemistry almost by accident. Eventually he became a Nobel prizewinner and chairman of the US Atomic Energy Commission.
He was also a compulsive keeper of a diary, which provides rich raw material. The Swedish reputation for humour is not high, but Seaborg had enough to keep him interested and observant of his own and others’ idiosyncrasies.…
