A Beautiful Mind: A Biography of John Forbes Nash, Jr., Winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics, 1994 [Paperback]

A Beautiful Mind in some ways could join the ranks of stories of famously eccentric Princetonians--such as that of chemist Hubert Alyea, the model for The Absent-Minded Professor, or Ralph Nader, said to have had his own key to the library as an undergraduate. Another much-related story on campus concerns the "Phantom of Fine Hall", a figure many students had seen shuffling around the corridors of the maths and physics building wearing purple sneakers and writing numerology treatises on the blackboards. This was in fact John Nash, one of the most brilliant mathematicians of his generation, who had spiralled into schizophrenia in the 1950s. His most important work had been in game theory, which by the 1980s was underpinning a large part of economics. When the Nobel Prize committee began debating a prize for game theory, Nash's name inevitably came up--only to be dismissed, since the prize clearly could not go to a madman. But in 1994 Nash, in remission from schizophrenia, shared the Nobel Prize in economics for work done some 45 years previously.

Economist and journalist Sylvia Nasar has written a biography of Nash that looks at all sides of his life. She gives an intelligent, understandable exposition of his mathematical ideas and a picture of schizophrenia that is evocative but decidedly unromantic. Her story of the machinations behind Nash's Nobel is fascinating and one of very few such accounts available in print (the CIA could learn a thing or two from the Nobel committees). This highly recommended book is indeed "a story about the mystery of the human mind, in three acts: genius, madness, reawakening". --Mary Ellen Curtin, Amazon.com --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Stories of famously eccentric Princetonians abound--such as that of chemist Hubert Alyea, the model for The Absent-Minded Professor, or Ralph Nader, said to have had his own key to the library as an undergraduate. Or the "Phantom of Fine Hall", a figure many students had seen shuffling around the corridors of the maths and physics building wearing purple sneakers and writing numerology treatises on the blackboards. The Phantom was John Nash, one of the most brilliant mathematicians of his generation, who had descended into schizophrenia in the 1950s. His most important work had been in game theory, which by the 1980s was underpinning much current economic theory. When the Nobel Prize committee began debating a prize for game theory, Nash's name inevitably came up-- only to be dismissed, since the prize clearly could not go to a madman. But in 1994 Nash, in remission from schizophrenia, shared the Nobel Prize in Economics for work done some 45 years previously.

Economist and journalist Sylvia Nasar has written a biography of Nash that looks at all sides of his life. She gives an intelligent, understandable exposition of his mathematical ideas and a picture of schizophrenia that is evocative but decidedly unromantic. Her story of the machinations behind Nash's Nobel Prize is fascinating and one of very few such accounts available in print (the CIA could learn a thing or two from the Nobel committees). This highly recommended book is indeed "a story about the mystery of the human mind, in three acts: genius, madness, reawakening." -- Mary Ellen Curtin --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

"The Boston Globe"Superbly written and eminently fascinating. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

An intriguing analysis of the tortured life of John Nash, mathematical genius and Nobel laureate extraordinary. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

As a gripping narrative, as an account of mental illness and as a study of a very interesting scholar, I think this book should find many readers. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

A detailed, sensitive and multi-sided account of the bizarre life of the mathematician John Nash. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

(This)brilliantly combines an intellectual history of an abstruse branch of mathematics, a love story, and an investigation into genius and madness. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

At the age of 21, a brilliant and highly eccentric graduate student made a major contribution to game theory: John Nash had discovered an influential theory of rational human behaviour. But ten years later, at the peak of a dazzling mathematical career and soon after his marriage to a physicist, Nash suffered a breakdown. Diagnosed a schizophrenic, he was beset by bizarre delusions, unable to work, and repeatedly incarcerated in mental hospitals. He spent most of the next three decades as a silent, ghost-like figure haunting the Princeton campus. Then, when he was 61 and all but forgotten, a dramatic remission of his illness and the Nobel Prize committee's decision to honour his achievements restored the world to him. His story is told in this book by an author who is intimately familiar with the academic world that Nash has occupied. She wrote it with the backing of Princeton and Nash's friends and colleagues. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Sylvia Nasar was born in Bavaria in 1947 to a German mother and Uzbek father. Her family emigrated to the United States in 1951 and lived in New York and Washington, DC, before moving to Ankara, Turkey, in 1960. In 1965, she returned to the USA and attended Antioch College where she majored in literature. After working for several years, she entered the PhD programme in Economics at New York University, completing a Master's degree in 1976. For a time, she did economics research, including with Nobel Laureate Wassily Leontief. At the age of thirty-five Nasar became a journalist. Since 1983 she has been a writer at Fortune, a columnist at US News & World Report and a reporter at the New York Times where she currently covers economics. A Beautiful Mind, her first book, was the winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography, and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Biography and the Helen Bernstein Book Award. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.