Extensive account of the physical universe and the essentials of its underlying mathematical theory. It assumes no specialist knowledge and contains vivid descriptive passages as well as hundreds of hand-drawn diagrams. Penrose won the 1988 Wolf Prize for physics which he shared with Stephen Hawking for their joint contribution to our understanding of the universe In a single work of colossal scope one of the world's greatest scientists has given us a complete and unrivalled guide to the glories of the universe that we all inhabit. 'Roger Penrose is the most important physicist to work in relativity theory except for Einstein.