A wonderful book. Much of the material is duplicated in the author's "Physical Foundations of General Relativity". Some parts of this book are a bit dated (see below*), but it has some beautiful old style illustrations which more than make up for that.
Topics such as Olbers' Paradox, Mach's Principle and the Principle of Equivalence are treated in a very transparent and compelling way. This book makes spacetime physics come alive for the reader who may not have rigorous training in mathematics and physics. It is a serious scientific exposition which manages to avoid technical difficulties and is reasonably accessible to the lay person.
*The book was published in 1959, a time when the Hoyle - Gold - Bondi Steady State Theory prevailed. Because of this, topics such as Olbers' Paradox are addressed in a way now considered obsolete. Nevertheless, this book and its author are referred to respectfully in "The Light-Dark Universe", the current standard reference for Olbers' Paradox.
The author was the thesis advisor for S. W. Hawking's doctoral work at Cambridge.
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