MY INVENTIONS , Nikola Tesla , Nikola Tesla
Museum Belgrade 2007 , with the correspondence between Nikola Tesla and Hugo
Gernsback ,
The work that represents the most reliable
testimony about numerous, important, and often crucial details from the life
and work of one of the greatest inventive and scientific minds in the whole
history of mankind, translated into various languages, published and quoted
more than any other work about Nikola Tesla, is the one that he wrote himself,
and to which he gave an unusual, and at the same time very simple title - My
Inventions.
Although My Inventions were, since they
were first printed, also published as a book, and are often perceived by
readers as a comprehensive autobiography, people well acquainted with Tesla's
life and work know that these are, in fact, articles published as a serial in
1919, in the well-known and at the time very popular magazine Electrical
Experimenter. Regrettably, Tesla never finished writing the story of his life
due to the deterioration of his relationship with his publisher and great
admirer, the Editor-in-Chief Hugo Gernsback.
The latest edition of Tesla's
autobiography, as one part of the new serial Popular Editions of the Nikola
Tesla Museum, established in the year of the 150th anniversary of Tesla's
birth, includes for the first time several new supplements that cannot be found
in any previous publications of this work. In addition to all six articles
comprising the book that Tesla titled My Inventions, this edition of the Nikola
Tesla Museum in Belgrade also includes the entire introduction written by Hugo
Gernsback and published in the Electrical Experimenter in January 1919. In that
issue, the Editor-in-Chief introduced his readers to Tesla's story and
announced a serial of his autobiographical articles, which will run for several
years, and that the articles will subsequently be published as a book. His
enormous respect for Tesla as the greatest inventor, Gernsback expressed in the
emphasized segment of this introduction with the words: “Nikola Tesla, in the
opinion of authorities, today is conceded to be the greatest inventor of all
times. Tesla has more original inventions to his credit than any other man in
history. He is considered greater than Archimedes, Faraday, or Edison. His
basic, as well as revolutionary, discoveries for sheer audacity have no equal
in the annals of the world. His master mind is easily one of the seven wonders
of the intellectual world.”
This edition of My Inventions also contains
all other Gernsback's introductions that accompanied the individual
installments of Tesla's autobiography, as well as a separate and substantial
supplemental - the correspondence between Tesla and his publisher.
Hugo Gernsbek (Hugo Gernsback 1884-1967)
rođen je kao Hugo Gernsbacher u Luksembrugu, a proslavio se kao američki pisac,
izumitelj, urednik i izdavač. Pored Žila Verna i Hebrerta DŽordža Velsa smatra
se jednim od začetnika naučne fantastike kao posebnog književnog žanra, kojem
je Gernsbek doprineo pre svega kroz svoju izdavačku delatnost. Hugo Gernsbek
odigrao je veoma važnu ulogu za Teslina dostignuća i sveukupan rad. On je
zaslužan što je Nikola Tesla ostavio za sobom svoje autobiografsko delo „Moji
izumi“ iz kojeg možemo da saznamo brojne detalje o mnogim ključnim trenucima u
naučnikovom životu. Naime, Gernsbek je krajem 1918. godine zamolio Teslu da
kroz seriju članaka u njegovom časopisu „Elektrikal eksperimenter“ napiše svojevrsnu
životnu priču i približi svoje izume široj publici. Smatra se da je ceo
autobiografski ciklus zapravo ostao nedovršen, jer sam kraj serijala nigde nije
nagovešten.