What is the setting of Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman?

The setting of Einstein's Dreams is Berne, Switzerland, the town where Albert Einstein works as a patent clerk in 1905 while he is writing his groundbreaking theory of relativity and exploring the nature of time. The city of Berne is central to the dreams in the novel, which explore snippets of everyday life throughout the city. People pass in the street, going to the market or heading to work, and each person has a story. Those stories are explored in Einstein's dreams.