The French Mathematician by Tom Petsinis
....I am a child again, running happily toward Mother, eager to tell her that I have learnt to count backwards to zero. The French mathematician is Evariste Galois, brilliant and tragic, whose work was dismissed by his contemporaries. A ferventRepublican in post-Revolutionary France, Galois was imprisoned at the age of twenty and died a year later in a mysterious early-morning duel. A quasi-autobiographical novel recreating Galois' world which will be enjoyed by anyone who savoured the intellectual drama of FERMAT'S LAST THEOREM. n nReviews n nThis fictionalized biography of theoretical mathematician Evariste nGalois (1811-32) was a best seller in Australia, and its U.S. nrelease represents a departure for the publisher, primarily nassociated with nonfiction titles and mysteries. One wishes the nhouse had picked a better candidate for its foray into nongenre nfiction. After a prolog (appropriately numbered 0) that prefigures nGalois's untimely death, the story begins with Galois's discovery nof his genius for math in a Parisian boarding school. A nprototypical nerd and not at all likeable, Galois sees math as a nmeans to fame and power. He forsakes sex, religion, friends, and nhis parents' needs for his science, but this youthful nsingle-mindedness doesn't add up to a very interesting plot nline'the mathematical formulae and proofs are actually more nexciting. Eventually, Galois becomes tangentially involved in the nrevolution against the king, ruining his academic career. He nhastily compiles his theories the night before the duel that ends nhis life at 20, but his theories live on, forming the basis for a nbranch of mathematics known as Group Theory. Though Petsinis tries nto impart a sense of freneticism, even the use of the first person nand the present tense don't make Galois's life seem more immediate. nA marginal purchase.'Reba Leiding, James Madison Univ., nHarrisonburg, VA n nIf Evariste Galois'a boy genius cut down in a romantic duel'had nonly been a painter, his life might have been penned by Irving nStone and played by Kirk Douglas in the movie version. But since he nwas a mathematician, he has had to wait 166 years, since his death nin 1832, for this valiant but strained debut from Australian nplaywright and fellow mathematician Petsinis. We meet narrator nEvariste in 1827, when he is a sullen teenager at the nLouis-le-Grand school in Paris. In his first class in geometry, he nexperiences an almost religious vision of mathematical order and nhenceforth dashes his parents' hopes for a respectable career as a nprovincial schoolteacher. When Evariste's father, a beleaguered nliberal politician and small-town mayor, commits suicide, however, nEvariste turns from mathematics to revolution. Though his efforts nare earnest, Petsinis never finds a style that can combine the nlanguage of mathematics and the language of passion. When, for nexample, Evariste receives the news of his father's death, we get nthis bit of misplaced erudition: I bit my lower lip, checking the nswell of emotion by bringing to mind my recent findings: The nessence of an equation could be brought to light through the nature nof the group formed from its coefficients. Although the world may nowe a debut to Evariste Galois for his discovery of group theory, nreaders who make it to the end of this novel may feel they've paid nmore than their fair share. (Sept.)
Publication Details
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Binding: Paperback
Published by: Penguin Books: , 1997
Edition:
ISBN: 9780140264722 | 0140264728
422 pages.
Book Condition: Very Good
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