Nonplussed by julian havil biography

September

Nonplussed! Mathematical proof of implausible ideas

by Julian Havil

A review of a book as good as this must either repeat the positive adjectives other reviewers have used, or require a very large thesaurus.

Since I find myself in complete agreement with all of the following words from other reviews, I will repeat them immediately: marvellous, crystal-clear, great, amazing, stimulating, delightful, fascinating, strong, surprising, classic, interesting, eclectic, insightful, magnificent.

That one book could encourage such gushing praise seems as unlikely as one book being able to cram in a great variety and depth of mathematical problems, colourful historical anecdotes, significant nods to ethno-mathematics, difficult but well-explained proofs, clear and engaging prose and beautiful diagrams.

Yet Havil's book succeeds on all counts.

That is what the book is like, but what is the book about? It would be easy to go along with the subtitle, mathem