"I reflected with pleasure on my conversations with the late Hungarian theoretician Nandor Balazs, one of Einstein's last assistants. Balazs did not try to hide Einstein's foibles - including his impatience with pestering journalists and autograph-hunters, his selfish pursuit of what would now be called "his own space" - but he stressed that Einstein was a man of exceptional kindness and generosity. So was he a saint?, I asked Balazs. "No," he replied firmly. "He was better than that - he was human.""