Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Typed letter signed ('A. Einstein') to Cornelius Lanczos, Old Lyme, Connecticut, 11 September 1935
In German. 1¼ pages, 267 x 185mm. Provenance: Sotheby's, 26-27 November 1980, lot 156.

An outburst against publishing science in Nazi Germany – and losing hope of a unified field theory. Einstein is very interested by Lanczos's most recent paper, 'but I cannot fathom that you as a Jew are still publishing in Germany. This is a form of betrayal. German intellectuals have as a whole behaved disgracefully in the face of all the horrible injustices and have richly deserved to be boycotted. If the non-Jews of other countries don't do it, it's already sad enough'. After this outburst, Einstein moves serenely on to scientific matters: 'Your treatment of the variation principle analogous to the canonical equations is very interesting and elegant'; however he warns that there are equations of the fourth order which are masked by the introduction of h^ik. 'I cannot yet fully assess the representation of the electromagnetic field', but he considers it 'difficult to consider as natural the representation of the electrical field through symmetrical derivation of a vector'. The letter concludes on a glum note: 'I have arrived after many disappointments at the opinion that we shall have to reconcile ourselves to the lack of an inner connection between the gravitational field and the electromagnetic field'.

The early career of Cornelius (Cornel) Lanczos (1893-1974) was closely associated with Einstein: he sent his doctoral thesis to Einstein in 1921, his first significant result in 1924 was an exact solution of the Einstein field equation representing a cylindrically symmetric rigidly rotating configuration of dust particles, and in 1928-29 he served as Einstein's assistant. By the time of the present letter he was dividing his time between his home in Hungary and a visiting professorship in Lafayette, Indiana.