22/10/2025
Nikola Tesla: the genius who wanted to illuminate the world, and ended up in darkness
Inventor. Visionary. Lonely.
Nikola Tesla's mind was running fast, too fast for the world around him. Born in 1856, in what is present-day Croatia, he showed from a very young age an intelligence that frightened the prodigy: he memorized entire books, spoke eight languages, saw in his head every already finished, already functional invention.
We owe him the AC, the electric motor, the first concepts of radio, radar, wireless transmission. He was the first to imagine a connected humanity, free and clean energy for all. He was the father of a future that we are still trying to achieve today.
But he was denied that future.
While his plans could change the world, they were stopped by those who wanted the world to stay the way it was. Thomas Edison, his most powerful rival, discredited him. The funders are backing out. Tesla's idea - free energy for all - scared the profit bosses too much.
He didn't think about money, he didn't patent everything. He was not seeking wealth but progress. And while others enriched themselves with his ideas, he ended up in the shadows. Ridiculed, ignored.
In his last years, he has been living alone in a hotel room in New York. He talked to pigeons, walked the streets at night, in his elegant clothes - the one thing he never wanted to lose. He kept on writing, inventing. But no one listened to him anymore.
He died on January 7, 1943, at the age of 86. Alone. Poor thing. His body was found days later No solemn funeral no celebration. Nothing but silence.
Yet today his name shines through. Statues, museums, biographies, even an electric car bears his name. The world that forgot him when he was alive celebrates him today as one of the greatest geniuses in history.
But the truth remains bitter: Tesla wasn't looking for fame. He was trying to enlighten humanity. And he did. Even though no one at the time ever told him.
Let this story remind us of one thing: dreams, when they are born, are fragile. And often the world only understands them when it's too late.
{PS}
