Being in the topic of Paul Dirac, there is a wonderful biography - <i></i>The Strangest Man: The Hidden Life of Paul Dirac, Quantum Genius<i></i>, by Graham Farmelo.<p>It is an exceptionally well-written biography of one of the greatest physicists, and a rare combination of a page-turner and a book written with the English reserve.<p>Besides the history of an important part of physics, and its historical background (including the rise of Nazism and Stalinism, WWII and later - Cold War) one can clearly see that science is not a dry product, polished from its very beginning. It's a process, created by various people, of different personalities and views, having simple and genial ideas, making blunt mistakes, and having life besides science (even Dirac).<p>Also, it shows science (here: physics) as a sociological process, with its centre shifting from Cambridge (centred around E. Rutherford), Copenhagen and Gottingen to Princeton, Moscow, ...<p>When it comes to Dirac himself - it's a moving example of a person, who may look as cold and devoid of emotions, but in fact is a loving father, loyal friend (defending the imprisoned (P. Kapitza), and excluded (W. Heisenberg)) and a responsible man. And one, who had never became reconciled with his brother's suicide.<p>The biography leaves a little doubt when it comes to Paul Dirac's autism, or Asperger's syndrome. While introversion, withdrawal, reticence, and persistence may stem from different causes, being literal-minded, characteristic response to stimuli and poor insight into other minds are, IMHO, hard to interpret in any other way.<p>(And a nicer review by one of my friends: <a href="http://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/~mkotowsk/reviews/3farmelo.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.math.uwaterloo.ca/~mkotowsk/reviews/3farmelo.html</a>)