Imagine being one of the foremost scientific minds in the world, beyond brilliant, yet steadily losing control of your physical movements and being told you have just two short years left of your life. Then imagine that this grim diagnosis is revealed when you’re only 21. This was the devastating reality that young Stephen Hawking dealt with in the early 1960s. Of course, many of us are now familiar with Dr. Hawking as a groundbreaking, world renowned theoretical physicist and cosmologist, but like me, you may not have known his whole story, which is what I was treated to when I watched “The Theory of Everything,” the Oscar nominated film which has recently been released on DVD. The film was one of the recent films shown at the library’s free Sunday Movie Matinees (Sundays, 2 p.m.)

Based on the book, “Traveling to Infinity: My Life with Stephen,” by Jane Hawking, the film gives us the background of how Hawking was diagnosed, met his wife, and the struggles and triumphs of his everyday life, which included trying to solve the nearly incomprehensible riddles of time and space.  Equally engrossing is the parallel story of his wife Jane. If you’re left further intrigued by Hawking and his theories (like I was!) you might also consider checking out one of our many titles by or about Stephen Hawking, such as “A Brief History of Time: From Black Holes to the Big Bang” or “The Grand Design.”