I have started The Man Who Loved Only Numbers by Paul Hoffman.
I had never heard of Paul Erdos, the subject of this book until I heard an edition of the Radio 4 programme, "A Further Five Numbers" [programme #3], when they were covering the number 6. The example of why 6 is important turned to levels of connection - any two people on Earth are separated by, on average, six "jumps". This moved on to a discussion of Bacon and Erdos numbers. A Bacon Number is the separation of an actor from working in a movie with Kevin Bacon. If the actor has worked with KB, they have a Bacon Number of 1. If they have worked with an actor who has worked with KB, their number is 2, and so forth. For an Erdos Number it is about the closeness to having written a mathematical paper with Paul Erdos.
This book is his biography from his birth in Hungary in 1913 to his death 83 years later. He was a mathematical genius. But he was incapable of almost anything else. He would show up at colleagues' houses, unannounced, with a view to staying for a while. He was welcome because, even though he was hard work, his insights could save months or years of work.
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