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Peter Pesic's tale of how maths came to be is as exciting as any fiction. -- Economist Pesic's book is a good place to begin to learn about this important piece of intellectual history. -- Fernando Q. Gouvea, American Scientist This book is a splendid essay on Abel's proof that the general quintic cannot be solved by radicals. The author does an excellent job of providing the historical and mathematical background so that the reader can understand why this question is so compelling. The vivid nontechnical style of the text captures the intricate dance of mathematics and the passionate lives of the people involved. --David A. Cox, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Amherst College A unique book. Peter Pesic's chronicle of the long road mathematicians traveled toward understanding when an equation can be solved--and when it can't--is enjoyable, lucid, and user-friendly. The author takes pains to credit less familiar names such as Viete and Ruffini and requires of his readers no more than basic algebra--and most of that placed conveniently apart from the main text. --Tony Rothman, Department of Physics, Bryn Mawr College Peter Pesic writes about Abel's work with enthusiasm and sensitivity, beautifully evoking this marvelous moment in the development of algebra. --Barry Mazur, Gerhard Gade University Professor, Harvard University Readers of Pesic's fascinating little book will be led to an inescapable verdict: Niels Abel was guilty of ingenuity in the fifth degree. --William Dunham, Muhlenberg College, and author of Journey through Genius: The Great Theorems of Mathematics

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Peter Pesic, writer, pianist, and scholar, is Director of the Science Institute and Musician-in-Residence at St. John's College, Santa Fe. He is the author of Abel's Proof- An Essay on the Sources and Meaning of Mathematical Unsolvability; Seeing Double- Shared Identities in Physics, Philosophy, and Literature; Sky in a Bottle; and Music and the Making of Modern Science, all published by the MIT Press.

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