This volume, sixth in an ongoing series of works by Princeton University Press, contains some of Albert Einstein’s more important papers on quantum theory and general relativity. Early versions of some of these papers had numerous inaccuracies in the text. This was because of the “publish or be damned” attitude prevalent at the time. Many scientists rushed to get their work published, and common mistakes crept into their papers as aspects of proof reading were overlooked.

The editors of this edition, along with the translator have tried to correct many of these errors, and have made notes in the margins where these corrections have been made. The translation itself is very close to the original German, and the editors have done an excellent job in building such a collection of unique papers together.

Einstein was one of the leading giants of twentieth century physics, and every physicist should at one time read one of his papers.