BOOK REVIEW: The Maniac

By Benjamin Labatut. Penguin Press, New York. Hard cover, 354 pp. US$28

John von Neumann, born Janos Lajos Neumann in Hungary in 1903, was called the smartest man alive. A crater on the moon is named in his honor. After he escaped from Europe in the 1930s, he emigrated to the United States, where he was an integral force in building the world’s first nuclear weapon. Although he died of cancer in 1957 at only age 54, accordi…