Author: Deborah Heiligman Illustrator: LeUyen Pham Roaring Brook Press June 2013
Synopsis (From Publisher):
Most people think of mathematicians as solitary, working away in isolation. And, it’s true, many of them do. But Paul Erdos never followed the usual path. At the age of four, he could ask you when you were born and then calculate the number of seconds you had been alive in his head. But he didn’t learn to butter his own bread until he turned twenty. Instead, he traveled around the world, from one mathematician to the next, collaborating on an astonishing number of publications. With a simple, lyrical text and richly layered illustrations, this is a beautiful introduction to the world of math and a fascinating look at the unique character traits that made “Uncle Paul” a great man.
CWR Review:
This book is about the life of the famous Hungarian mathematician Paurl Erdos (pronounced air-dish). The author chronicles Paulโs life from childhood until his death in the mid 1990โs. The adventure begins in Budapest, Hungary, and shows how his love for math manifests at a very young age. His mother was a math teacher herself who probably instilled this love for math in her son. Paul did not do well in school because he did not like rules (crazy to think that a mathematician did not like rules!) so was homeschooled by his motherโs dear friend, referred to as Fraulein. Paul loved math and people, and traveled the world to meet and work with other mathematicians’. The author even shares of Paulโs arrest when the U.S government had mistaken him for a spy. Paul Erdos loved numbers and math, and he shared his love with as many as he could around the world.
I enjoyed reading about Paulโs life and learning a bit about math as I read it. In addition to his life story the author teaches about different math concepts such as prime numbers, basic multiplication, and even the definitions of epsilon and infinity. As interesting as Paulโs life was, youโll observe that he had very poor character. He did not have any personal responsibility. Other people had to clean up his messes and do his laundry. This will make for a great character-building conversation: you can have a great mind that can do complex math problems but if you can’t do your own laundryโฆ
The illustrations have a light-hearted cartoon look to them which further shield young readers from the hard realities during Paulโs time. Mind you, he lived in Hungary as a Jew during the 1930โs and escaped to America as Nazism began to spread. Considering this is the backdrop of the story, the illustrations and laugh out loud text with simple vocabulary would never lead you to think it. I enjoyed it, I learned from it, it was okay.
Interesting read, you’ll learn things, good talks about characterโฆget yours here or here.
Themes- math, mathematicians, European/Hungarian/Jewish history
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