While our current students are in the midst of learning essay writing from Dr. Alan Lightman, the author, astrophysicist, and GPSW Professor of the Practice of the Humanities is being written about himself. This morning, the New York Times published an intimate profile of Dr. Lightman that covers why Lightman chose to “walk away from the world of black holes to enter the world of black ink.”

Written by Dennis Overbye, the Times science journalist who originally reviewed Lightman’s groundbreaking novel Einstein’s Dreams in the early 90s, the piece chronicles how a physicist whose literary work largely centers around grappling with the fluidity of time conceptualizes the rigidity of it in his own life.

“For years and years and years I was the youngest person in the room, and now it seems like I’m the oldest person in the room,” Lightman said in the piece, “And I wonder: How did that happen?”

You can read Overbye’s story right over here or head here to check out some of Dr. Lightman’s books.