It takes a village to write my books. Helpful inhabitants thereof include our four children, to whom the book is dedicated, as well as fellow dedicatees Dr. Fred and M.A. Sue Finkelstein, our best friends and spirited co-debaters for forty-five years, and finally my sharpest critic, my beloved wife, Sherry, who read every word of everything more than once. Likewise, I am indebted to my agent, Peter Bernstein, who kept faith in the project, and my editor at Dey Street/HarperCollins, Jessica Sindler, who possesses an uncanny capacity for shaping material to make it speak to the modern world. During my heyday at Yale, I benefited greatly from the insights and kindness of several valued colleagues who annually visited the “genius course” to serve as “guest presenters.” Among them were physics professor Doug Stone, from whom I learned enormously; mathematician Jim Rolf; microbiologist and now Yale provost Scott Strobel; and, finally, Chief Investment Officer David Swensen, whom I always saved for the last class because, as a generous philanthropist, he understood that, although the genius needs money, money isn’t genius. In addition, over the years I benefited from half a dozen class presentations by the gifted neuroscientist Caroline Robertson, now at Dartmouth, as well as visits by the late novelist Anita Shreve, the late art historian David Rosand, entrepreneurs Roger McNamee and Kevin Ryan, director of the Metropolitan Opera Peter Gelb, and cultural provocateur extraordinaire Adam Glick. With a topic as broad as genius, I was continually casting about for help on specific topics, and I received it generously from longtime friend Leon Plantinga (Beethoven), Kitty Ferguson (Hawking), Nobel Prize winner Kip Thorne (ideation among physicists), Lucas Swineford (online education), and Jack Meyers, president of the Rockefeller Archives. Several people kindly critiqued chapters, among them my son Christopher, my daughter-in-law Melanie, my colleague Keith Polk, my neighbors Pam Reiter, Ken Marsh, and Bashar Nejidwi, and literary gadfly Clark Baxter, who has a special talent for sending out “zingers” to hit a target that no one else can see. Thanks to you all!