Who Was the Best Soviet Physicist?

Nobel Prize winner, imprisoned for political activism, best known for his books covering the entirety of theoretical physics

It’s not always possible to choose the best one in the field. However, in the 70-year period of the USSR, one physicist distinguished himself among all others based on his research, sharp intellect, and his contribution to physics in the Soviet Union and worldwide. Because of his ways of doing things and extremely low error rates, he is idolized among physics students, while due to his insightfulness, he is highly respected among scientists.

For most people who knew him, he was witty, ruthless, eccentric, and arrogant. Very few knew his gentle side. He had a very simple criterion for good scientific work — it must explain something puzzling. Once he said:

“This work contains many things which are new and interesting. Unfortunately, everything that is new is not interesting, and everything which is interesting, is not new.”

He received the Nobel Prize in 1962 for the theory of superfluidity, but his research covered all branches of theoretical physics, ranging from fluid mechanics to quantum field theory. He is best known for his monumental work, the 10-volume series of books about theoretical physics…