Alfred Nobel was not a happy person. His many private letters confirm the picture of a lonely, ascetic man in bad health, bur- dened with work and hypochondria. He was a man of high morals, often helpful but never showing off. He shunned high society, and ridiculed vanity and outward fineries. He often described himself as a loner, hermit, melancholic or misanthrope. Nobel himself, however remains a figure of paradoxes and contradictions, a brilliant, lonely man, part pessimist and part idealist