A decade later he would recite this passage from memory: Perhaps she would not have considered evil to be so rare, so extraordinary, so estranging a state, to which it was so restful to emigrate, had she been able to discern in herself, as in everyone, that indifference to the sufferings one causes, an indifference which, whatever other names one may give it, is the terrible and permanent form of cruelty. A great thing in my life, a great and lasting part of it, more to me now, even more as I look back when my life is nearly over.' He had been reading Proust by flashlight. In 1926, visiting Corsica with friends, Oppenheimer experienced what he described long afterward as 'not a mere love affair, not a love affair at all, but love. He was also ambitious, articulate, rashly dismissive of intellectual pretenders, kind and generous to students and given to sometimes inexplicable behavior under personal stress. Oppenheimer was high-strung, soft-spoken and a polymath. What may have seemed leftist sympathies were the conscience of an enlightened human being, as they were for a good many persons during the 1930’s and 40’s. Sherwin (professor of English and American history at Tufts University) argue-and it seems irrefutable-that the Ethical Culture philosophy underpinned many of Oppenheimer’s later actions. The authors, Kai Bird (contributing editor of The Nation) and Martin J.

Attending the society’s private school, young Oppenheimer grew up in an atmosphere of responsible awareness. The Ethical Culture Society, founded by Felix Adler, emphasized the individual’s obligation to act on behalf of others, especially those less fortunate than oneself. Robert-later Opje, or Oppie-began his life on the Upper West Side of New York City in 1904 in a Jewish household where Jewish traditions played no role.

American Prometheus by Kai Bird and Martin J.