The Man Who Knew Infinity: A Life of the Genius Ramanujan

In 1913, a young, unschooled Indian clerk wrote a letter to G. H. Hardy, begging that pre-eminent English mathematician’s opinion on several ideas he had about numbers. Hardy, realizing the letter was the work of a genius, arranged for Srinivasa Ramanujan to come to England. Thus began one of the most remarkable collaborations ever chronicled.

With a passion for rich and evocative detail, Robert Kanigel takes us from the temples and teeming slums of Madras to the courts and chapels of C…