King of Infinite Space: Donald Coxeter, the Man Who Saved Geometry
by Siobhan Roberts
List Price:
Our Price: $7.21
You Save: $20.74 (74%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Siobhan RobertsEdition: Hardcover
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2006-09-05
ISBN: 0802714994
Number of pages: 320
Publisher: Walker & Company
Book Reviews of King of Infinite Space: Donald Coxeter, the Man Who Saved Geometry
Book Review: Mathematical Biography
Summary: 4 Stars
'Donald Coxeter, the Man Who Saved Geometry' is the book's subtitle, so you can guess Siobhan Roberts wanted to write a 'conspiracy bio' with the hero (with all his personal flaws) proving his point before the judgement of his peers, that the old ways really are the best.
So the book's material includes a lot of context about 'geometry'- the knowledge and the practice, the mathematical community's heroes/heroines and villains/ villainesses, and even 8 Appendices, one of which is entitled 'Crystallography and Penrose Toilet Paper'. The narrative flips back and forth in the TV documentary style, starting and ending with Coxeter as he was just before his death on 31.3.03, aged 96.
With a foreword and more by the great Douglas Hofstadter, in-text photos including some Escher masterpieces directly influenced by Coxeter, and meticulous sourcing and bibliography, I enjoyed the book immensely apart from the Hollywood leanings - the Penrose connection is a tasty journalistic snippet, but it just don't belong....So, great that such a biography gets written, good that a Toronto-based journalist with mathematical contacts of the calibre of John Horton Conway and Marjorie Senechal gets to do it, bad that a reprint revising some minor typos (Saversnake Forest?!?!) hasn't been released in paperback yet!
Biographies & Memoirs Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Audiobooks on Cassette
- Audiobooks on CD
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- e-Books
- Engineering
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Medicine
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in 21st-century Biographies of Notable Mathematicians
Ernst Zermelo: An Approach to His Life and Workby Heinz-Dieter Ebbinghaus
Springer; Published: 2007-04-04; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $47.25
Price in other shops:
Dark Hero of the Information Age: In Search Of Norbert Wiener--Father of Cyberneticsby Flo Conway, Jim Siegelman
Basic Books; Published: 2004-12-13; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $3.68
Price in other shops:
The Apprenticeship of a Mathematicianby Andre Weil
Birkhauser; Published: 1992-03; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $81.99
The Volterra Chronicles: The Life and Times of an Extraordinary Mathematician 1860-1940 (History of Mathematics)by Judith R. Goodstein
American Mathematical Society; Published: 2007-02-13; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $57.12
Price in other shops:
Alfred Tarski: Life and Logicby Anita Burdman Feferman, Solomon Feferman
Cambridge University Press; Published: 2004-10-04; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $13.50
Price in other shops:
James Joseph Sylvester: Jewish Mathematician in a Victorian Worldby Karen Hunger Parshall
The Johns Hopkins University Press; Published: 2006-05-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $36.70
Price in other shops:
Prime Obsession: Bernhard Riemann and the Greatest Unsolved Problem in Mathematicsby John Derbyshire
Joseph Henry Press; Published: 2003; Paperback; Book
Best price: $24.99
The Legacy of Mario Pieri in Geometry and Arithmeticby Elena Anne Marchisotto, James T. Smith
Birkh?user Boston; Published: 2007-05-08; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $44.65
Price in other shops:
R. L. Moore: Mathematician & Teacher (Spectrum Series)by John Parker
The Mathematical Association of America; Published: 2005-12-15; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.00
Price in other shops:
Saunders Mac Lane: A Mathematical Autobiographyby Saunders Mac Lane
AK Peters, Ltd.; Published: 2005-05-25; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $44.10
Price in other shops:
Similar books summaries and other product reviews
I Am a Strange Loopby Douglas R. Hofstadter
Basic Books; Published: 2008-07-07; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.85
Price in other shops:
The Pythagorean Theorem: A 4,000-Year Historyby Eli Maor
Princeton University Press; Published: 2007-05-21; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.61
Price in other shops:
Dr. Euler's Fabulous Formula: Cures Many Mathematical Illsby Paul J. Nahin
Princeton University Press; Published: 2006-04-10; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.30
Price in other shops:
The Trouble With Physics: The Rise of String Theory, The Fall of a Science, and What Comes Nextby Lee Smolin
Mariner Books; Published: 2007-09-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.99
Price in other shops:
Regular Polytopesby H. S. M. Coxeter
Dover Publications; Published: 1973-06-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.71
Price in other shops:
Why Beauty Is Truth: A History of Symmetryby Ian Stewart
Perseus Books Group; Published: 2007-04-30; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $8.92
Price in other shops:
The Poincare Conjecture: In Search of the Shape of the Universeby Donal O'Shea
Walker & Company; Published: 2007-12-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.88
Price in other shops:
Symmetry and the Monster: The Story of One of the Greatest Quests of Mathematicsby Mark Ronan
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2007-09-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $10.74
Price in other shops:
Unknown Quantity: A Real and Imaginary History of Algebraby John Derbyshire
Plume; Published: 2007-05-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.47
Price in other shops:
Yearning for the Impossible: The Surprising Truths of Mathematicsby John Stillwell
AK Peters, Ltd.; Published: 2006-05-22; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $21.85
Price in other shops: