‘A Brief History of Time’ was first published in 1988. Stephen Hawking’s popular science book, subtitled ‘From the Big Bang to Black Holes,’ introduced cosmology to a mass audience in unusually accessible language.
Hawking discussed the universe’s origin, expansion, black holes, space-time, quantum theory, and the possibility of a unified theory. His publisher worried that technical equations would discourage general readers, so the finished book contains only one famous equation: E = mc². Carl Sagan wrote the introduction to the original edition.
The book became an international bestseller and remained on bestseller lists for months. Later editions added illustrations and updated material, while Hawking and Leonard Mlodinow published the shorter, revised ‘A Briefer History of Time’ in 2005. A common mix-up is confusing the book with Errol Morris’s 1991 documentary, which shares its title but is a biographical film about Hawking rather than a filmed version of the book.