A note that Albert Einstein gave to a courier in Tokyo, briefly describing his theory on happy living, has surfaced after 95 years and is up for auction in Jerusalem.
The year was 1922, and the German-born physicist, most famous for his theory of relativity, was on a lecture tour in Japan. He had recently been informed that he was to receive the Nobel Prize for physics, and his fame outside of scientific circles was growing. A Japanese courier arrived at the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo to deliver Einstein a message. The courier either refused to accept a tip, in line with local practice, or Einstein had no small change available. Either way, Einstein didn’t want the messenger to leave empty-handed, so he wrote him two notes by hand in German, according to the seller, a relative of the messenger.
A picture taken on October 19, 2017, shows Gal Wiener, owner and manager of the Winner’s auction house in Jerusalem, displays two notes written by Albert Einstein, in 1922, on hotel stationary from the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo Japan. (AFP Photo/Menahem Kahana)
“Maybe if you’re lucky those notes will become much more valuable than just a regular tip,” Einstein told the messenger, according to the seller, a resident of the German city of Hamburg who wished to remain anonymous. One note, on the stationary of the Imperial Hotel Tokyo, says that “a quiet and modest life brings more joy than a pursuit of success bound with constant unrest.”
The other, on an otherwise blank piece of paper, simply reads: “where there’s a will, there’s a way.”
The two notes will go on sale on Tuesday at the Winner’s auction house in Jerusalem, alongside other items including two letters Einstein wrote in later years.
— AFP
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