Hardy and Ramanujan
C.P. Snow
C.P.Snow's "Hardy and Ramanujan" is an extract of his book Variety of Men. This prose on Ramanujan is taken from the biography of the mathematician Hardy. It describes Hardy's interest on Ramanujan, his invitation of Ramanujan to London and their contribution to maths. The details are given from the perception of Hardy.
Hardy was a renowned mathematician working as a professor at Cambridge University. In 1913, January he received an untidy envelope from India. The sheets inside were not clean and written mathematical theories in non-English script. He looked at those signs with no interest and soon felt bored. Most of the theorems were either wild without any proof or already known. Hardy got irritated by it and left them aside.
One day, Hardy could not concentrate on anything. The wild theorems of the Indian started disturbing him. He doubted the Indian either a fraud or a genius. So he called for his friend Littlewood. They discussed the theorems in Hardy's room. Soon, they understood that those letters were from a genius mathematician. Before sending the manuscript to Hardy, Ramanujan had sent it to two more Maths professors in London. But they could not evaluate the knowledge of Ramanujan. Next, Hardy invited Ramanujan to England with the help of Trinity College which funded many geniuses earlier.
In 1914, Ramanujan reached London. Both Ramanujan and Hardy developed a close relationship. Hardy thought that Ramanujan was an untrained genius. Ramanujan did not have proficiency in English. So, when Hardy talked about general things in English, Ramanujan looked confused. Even in maths, Ramanujan was a self-taught. Hardy once thought that if Ramanujan had got education, he would be lesser in knowledge. Later he corrected himself by thinking that Ramanujan would be wonderful if he had better education. Hardy taught Ramanujan some formal maths. They both produced five papers of the highest knowledge. The Royal society of England elected Ramnujan as a Fellow at the age of thirty. He also received a Fellowship from Trinity. Ramanujan was the first Indian to receive such honour in England.
The climate of London made Ramnujan to be ill soon. He was admitted in a hospital. The famous taxi-cab number incident took place in the hospital. Hardy went to meet Ramanujan in the hospital by a taxi. He started the conversation by stating that the taxi number in which he travelled was a dull number 1729, which activated Ramanujan. He replied immediately that was a very interesting number by stating "smallest number expressible as the sum of two cubes in two different ways". This showed the intelligence and interest of Ramanujan in maths. Ramanujan died of tuberculosis in Madras at the age of thirty-three. In his apology Hardy mentions the list of great mathematicians who all died at young ages.