Professor Stephen Hawking has revealed he often feels lonely as people are too scared to talk to him – and even Nelson Mandela sat in silence and could not stop staring.
The physicist, 73, who suffers from motor neurone disease, also said some people were just too impatient to wait for him to answer with his voice synthesiser.
Hawking said: “At times I get very lonely because people are afraid to talk to me or don’t wait for me to write a response.”
He claimed that the issue is made even harder because he suffers from shyness.
Hawking, who lectures at Cambridge University, said: “I’m shy and tongue-tied at times. I find it difficult to talk to people who I don’t know.”
He made the admissions to life-long fan and comedian Dara O’Briain in a revealing BBC documentary to be aired tomorrow.
It features the scientist’s former PA, Judith Croasdell, who recalled how he had an awkward meeting with Mandela, the former South African president, in 2008.
She said: “Hawking said at first he thought Mandela was gaga. He said, ‘He was just staring at me.’
“I said, ‘Well, it didn’t occur to you that he may have thought, ‘What on earth is this, how can I talk to this man?’
“They both looked at each other as if they were from another planet, and then suddenly there was a lot of bleeping and squeaking and stuff and this voice booms out, ‘How nice it is to meet the great Nelson Mandela.’
“I imagine he thought, ‘Oh, he does speak!’”
Joking about love, twice-married Hawking, played by Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything, said: “Women are a mystery to me – that’s the fun part.”
The documentary also includes rare interviews with Hawking’s children from his first wife Jane – Lucy, 45 and Tim, 36. Tim told how his father’s voice synthesiser helped them build a relationship.
Tim said: “As a three-year-old I had no understanding of what he would say. I didn’t really have any communication with him for the first five years of my life.”
“It was only when he got his voice synthesiser that I was actually able to start having conversations with him.”
Tim would often use his dad’s wheelchair as a go-kart and type swear words into the computer for a laugh.
They shared a love of motor racing and would join Formula 1 mogul Frank Williams – who also used a wheelchair – to watch races from the Williams pit.
Lucy Hawking, daughter of Jane and Stephen Hawking with mum Jane and brother RobertFamily: Stephen with first wife Jane, Lucy and Robert
Tim added his dad was fiercely competitive when they played board games.
“There was no compassion,” he said, smiling. “He wasn’t the easiest opponent at any game, particularly chess.”
Lucy admitted watching The Theory of Everything was deeply emotional.
She said: “The bit that was the most moving for me was when Eddie Redmayne gets out of his wheelchair during a lecture to pick up a pen.
“I’ve never seen my dad walking. It was like seeing him as he’d have been without the motor neurone disease.”
And Hawking, who also has an older son, Robert, 48, revealed his biggest regret as a father.
The professor said: “When my children were young I missed not being able to physically play with them.”
Article was originally published in the Mirror.