Math Makers: The Lives and Works of 50 Famous Mathematicians

Posamentier and Spreitzer, math teachers and coauthors of The Mathematics of Everyday Life, trace the lives of great mathematicians, including household names such as Euclid, Archimedes, Fibonnaci, Newton, and Godel, and lesser-known but still significant figures. The authors provide each with a short biography, delighting in personal idiosyncrasies. For example, Georg Cantor, originator of set theory, published pamphlets arguing that Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare’s works; John von Neumann, responsible for game theory, could recite Goethe’s Faust in its entirety; and G.H. Hardy, a number theory maven, could write numbers from one to a million at the age of two. Wisely, Posamentier and Spreitzer acknowledge when the math is too advanced to do justice to, admitting that fully explaining Boolean algebra would require another book, or that they can give only a “vague idea” of Sofia Kovalevskaya’s work on partial differential equations. Though few women enter the book’s pantheon, the authors are careful to note the obstacles female mathematicians faced. Posamentier and Spreitzer’s affection for their field is winning, and while fans of math and intellectual puzzles in general can enjoy trying to solve the proofs, the less ambitious will enjoy the brisk and colorful biographies. (Jan.)