Advanced Study

This chapter details events in Ernst Kantorowicz's life after being fired from Berkeley. He eventually secured a permanent position at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. From the start, Kantorowicz felt very comfortable at the Institute and was widely admired. He did not have to barter “beads and little mirrors” to make new friends. In short order, he became excellent friends with Erwin Panofsky. Kantorowicz and “Pan” were roughly the same age, came from similar wealthy Jewish-German backgrounds, and matched each other as devastatingly witty savants. An even more famous person with whom he gained friendship at the Institute was the director, J. Robert Oppenheimer.