Sir Roger Penrose explains the impact of his time at Cambridge in the 1950s and the recent developments in Roger Penrose’s thought. The interview brings out his highly unconventional choice of subjects for deep study, which completely ignored the boundary between ‘pure’ and ‘applied’ mathematics. Those familiar with his world-leading development of relativity theory in the 1960s may be surprised to learn how much he was influenced by quantum theory in the 1950s, and also by the early origin of his new ideas.

Roger Penrose explains the influence of Dirac, Sciama and other leading figures of the 1950s, and goes on to characterise the emergence of twistor theory.