Hawking and family tell children the secret of the universe
Sunday, 24 June 2007
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Stephen Hawking, whose brilliant mind and robotic voice inspired millions of people to buy his hit book, A Brief History of Time, plans to do it again - but this time for children.
The book, George's Secret Key to the Universe, tells the story of a scientist, his daughter, an inquisitive child and a supercomputer called Cosmos. That fictional filial relationship holds another key - to the next chapter of Professor Hawking's life, because the book was co-written by his daughter, Lucy, one of his three children.
For the brilliant theoretical physicist and author, it is more than a mere attempt to unlock the secrets of the universe for a generation of curious kids. His first shot at children's fiction, out this September, has given the scientist a chance to rebuild relations with his family, which were all but destroyed by a disastrous second marriage that broke down last year.
Ms Hawking, 36, said writing the story had helped to make a fresh start with her father, who was struck down with motor neurone disease when he was 22. The single mother - she has one child - was hit hard by his desertion. "Working together brought my Dad and I much closer together," she said.
Since splitting up with Elaine, the former nurse for whom he left his first wife, Jane, in 1991, Professor Hawking is making up for time lost during dark years that saw him repeatedly in the accident and emergency department of his local Cambridgeshire hospital. Professor Hawking suffered a catalogue of injuries - from heatstroke and severe sunburn after he was left alone in the garden on a blistering summer day, to a wrist fracture.
And, at one point, it appeared he was in danger of losing his voice as his computer speech synthesiser began to age beyond repair.
Now with harmony restored to his personal life and a new computer every 18 to 24 months from Intel, Professor Hawking is thinking optimistically about the future and the stars. In April, he escaped from his wheelchair in a zero-gravity flight that he took as a precursor to buying himself a seat on Sir Richard Branson's first commercial space flight in 2009.
With his new book, the first in a trilogy, he hopes to make physics fun. "It is very important for young people to maintain their ability to marvel at the world around them and to keep asking 'why?'" he said.
The book was dreamt up by his daughter. She wanted to write it to give her autistic nine-year-old son, William, a chance to understand what her father has achieved. "I imagined a story for children in which the adventures are based on real physics," she said. "Is there any bigger adventure than space?"
