The Improbable Life of Paul Erdos - The Boy Who Loved Math

The subtitle of this book is "The Improbable Life of Paul Erdos"; it could as well be "an improbable topic for a picture book". So how does Deborah Heiligman manage to pull it off? This author of the awards-winning "Charles and Emma" has a unique talent for presenting biography, to all ages. She knows how to find a special "way in" to her subjects' lives, to find a story that hasn't been told before, and to give that story just the right structure and voice -- creating a story that children or young adults will actually want to hear.

Text and illustrations (delightful, by LeUyen Pham) are spotted with numbers. The book begins, "Paul Erdos lived in Budapest, Hugary, with his Mama. Mama loved Paul to infinity. Paul loved Mama to ∞ too!" And so we enter the mind of a person with a passion for numbers. We learn about Paul's life, we learn about numbers, and we learn about creative obsession, which for me is the biggest take-away from this book. THE BOY WHO LOVED MATH is about "the kind of person" who "didn't like to follow rules. So he invented his own way to live."

"So he invented his own way to live." I like that.

This book is worth having for the illustrations alone; the delightful drawings of Budapest in the early 20th Century are so colorful and gorgeous, they draw you right into a magical world. The story is equally magical; Paul Erdos at age of four could tell you the number of seconds you'd been alive, and do that calculation from your birth date right in his head. A prodigy. His life as a mathematician is fascinating stuff and this colorful book can encourage children to find the magic in mathematics. That advertisement for AT&T Wireless, with the kids sitting around a table, coming up with "Infinity Plus One" and then "Infinity TIMES Infinity"- POOF! will be even more fun after reading this book.

I can tell you from my own experience, a positive early experience with mathematics makes for a fearless, excited student. Even if your child isn't naturally a math whiz, creating an atmosphere of curiosity and wonder around numbers will make homework and learning an adventure. What would Paul Erdos do? He'd study his multiplication tables, that's what he'd do.

This story is one that you'll enjoy reading to your children and you will certainly will be hitting Wikipedia afterward to learn more about Paul Erdos.

This would be great for a classroom or for rereading at home to math-obsessed kids. Repetition of the word "problem" to describe the ups and downs of Paul's childhood and the use of numbers in the text and illustrations help reinforce the book's math themes. Erdos' mathematical concepts are probably over the heads of most young readers (and frankly, mine as well), but the narrative has lots of kid-friendly elements including Erdos' childhood antics and his later use of the term "epsilon" to describe children. I have never read such detailed author and illustrator notes in a picture book, but author and illustrator have clearly done their homework and reading their notes gave me a deeper appreciation for the book.

Make a beeline for your local library's children's biography section and learn firsthand the shocking truth about picture book bios of mathematical geniuses. Apparently there was only one and his name was Einstein. End of story. The world as we know it is not overflowing with picture book encapsulations of the lives of Sir Isaac Newton or Archimedes (though admittedly you could probably drum up a Leonardo da Vinci book or two if you were keen to try). But when it comes to folks alive in the 20th century, Einstein is the beginning and the end of the story. You might be so foolish as to think there was a good reason for that fact. Maybe all the other mathematicians were dull. I mean, Einstein was a pretty interesting fella, what with his world-shattering theories and crazed mane. And true, the wild-haired physicist was fascinating in his own right, but if we're talking out-and-out interesting people, few can compare with the patron saint of contemporary mathematics, Paul Erdős. Prior to reading this book I would have doubted a person could conceivably make an engaging biography chock full to overflowing with mathematical concepts. Now I can only stare in amazement at a story that could conceivably make a kid wonder about how neat everything from Euler's map of Konigsburg to the Szekeres Snark is. This is one bio you do NOT want to miss. A stunner from start to finish.

For you see, there once was a boy who loved math. His name was Paul and he lived in Budapest, Hungary in 1913. As a child, Paul adored numbers, and theorems, and patterns, and tricky ideas like prime numbers. As he got older he grew to be the kind of guy who wanted to do math all the time! Paul was a great guy and a genius and folks loved having him over, but he was utterly incapable of taking care of himself. Fortunately, he didn't have to. Folks would take care of Paul and in exchange he would bring mathematicians together. The result of these meetings was great strides in number theory, combinatorics, the probabilistic method, set theory, and more! Until the end of this days (when he died in a math meeting) Paul loved what he did and he loved the people he worked with. "Numbers and people were his best friends. Paul Erdős had no problem with that."

There are two kinds of picture book biographies in this world. The first attempts to select just a single moment or personality quirk from a person's life, letting it stand in as an example of the whole. Good examples of this kind of book might include Me...Jane by Patrick McDonnell about the childhood of Jane Goodall or Lincoln Tells a Joke How Laughter Saved the President And the Country by Kathleen Krull. It's hard to pinpoint the perfect way to convey any subject, but it can sometimes be even harder to tell an entire life in the span of a mere 40 pages or so. Still, that tends to be the second and more common kind of picture book biography out there. Generally speaking they don't tend to be terribly interesting. Just a series of rote facts, incapable of making it clear to a kind why a person mattered aside from the standard "because I said so" defense. The Boy Who Loved Math is different because it really takes the nature of biography seriously. If the purpose of a bio is to make it clear that a person was important, how important was a guy who loved math puzzles? Well, consider what the story can do. In a scant number of pages author Deborah Heiligman gives us an entire life synthesized down to just a couple key moments, giving the man's life form and function and purpose, all while remaining lighthearted and fun to read. Who does that?

Did you know that there are kids out there who like math? I mean, reeeeeeally like math? The kinds that beg their parents for math problems to solve? They exist (heck, Ms. Heiligman gave birth to one) and for those kids this book will come like a present from on high. Because not only does the author highlight a fellow who took his passion for numbers and turned it into a fulfilling and fun life, but thanks to illustrator LeUyen Pham the illustrations are overflowing with math equations and puzzles and problems, just waiting to be interpreted and dissected. I have followed the career of Ms. Pham for many years. There is no book that she touches that she does not improve with her unique style. Whether it's zeroing in on a child's neuroses in Alvin Ho or bringing lush life to a work of poetry as in A Stick Is an Excellent Thing, Pham's art can run the gamut from perfect interstitial pen-and-inks to lush watercolor paints. I say that, but I have never, but ever, seen anything like what she's done in The Boy Who Loved Math.

It would not be overstating the matter to call this book Pham's masterpiece. The common story behind its creation is that there was some difficulty finding the perfect artist for it because whosoever put pen to paper here would have to be comfortable on some level with incorporating math into the art. Many is the artist who would shy away from that demand. Not Ms. Pham. She takes to the medium like a duck to water, seemingly effortlessly weaving equations, charts, diagrams, numbers, and theorems into pictures that also have to complement the story, feature the faces of real people, capture a sense of time (often through clothing) and place (often through architecture), and hardest of all, be fun to look at.

But that's just for starters. The final product is MUCH more complex. I'm not entirely certain what the medium is at work here but if I had to guess I'd go with watercolors. Whatever it is, Pham's design on each page layout is extraordinary. Sometimes she'll do a full page, border to border, chock full of illustrations of a single moment. That might pair with a page of interstitial scenes, giving a feel to Paul's life. Or consider the page where you see a group of diners at a restaurant, their worlds carefully separated into dotted squares (a hat tip to one of Paul's puzzles) while Paul sits in his very own dotted pentagon. It's these little touches that make it clear that Paul isn't like other folks. All this culminates in Pham's remarkable Erdős number graph, where she outdoes herself showing how Paul intersected with the great mathematicians of the day. Absolutely stunning.

Both Heiligman and Pham take a great deal of care to tell this tale as honestly as possible. The extensive "Note From the Author" and "Note From the Illustrator" sections in the back are an eye-opening glimpse into what it takes to present a person honestly to a child audience. In Pham's notes she concedes when she had to illustrate without a guide at hand. For example, Paul's babysitter ("the dreaded Faulein") had to be conjured from scratch. She is the rare exception, however. Almost every face in this book is a real person, and it's remarkable to look and see Pham's page by page notes on who each one is.

Heiligman's author's note speaks less to what she included and more to what she had to leave out. She doesn't mention the fact that Paul was addicted to amphetamines and honestly that sort of detail wouldn't have served the story much at all. Similarly I had no problem with Paul's father's absence. Heiligman mentions in her note what the man went through and why his absences would make Paul's mother the "central person in his life emotionally". The book never denies his existence, it just focuses on Paul's mother as a guiding force that was perhaps in some way responsible for the man's more quirky qualities. The only part of the book that I would have changed wasn't what Heiligman left out but what she put in. At one point the story is in the midst of telling some of Paul's more peculiar acts as a guest (stabbing tomato juice cartons with knives, waking friends up at 4 a.m. to talk math, etc.). Then, out of the blue, we see a very brief mention of Paul getting caught by the police when he tried to look at a radio tower. That section is almost immediately forgotten when the text jumps back to Paul and his hosts, asking why they put up with his oddities. I can see why placing Paul in the midst of the Red Scare puts the tale into context, but I might argue that there's no real reason to include it. Though the Note for the Author at the end mentions that because of this act he wasn't allowed back in the States for a decade, it doesn't have a real bearing on the thrust of the book. As they say in the biz, it comes right out.

I have mentioned that this book is a boon for the math-lovers of the world, but what about the kids who couldn't care diddly over squat about mathy malarkey? Well, as far as I'm concerned the whole reason this book works is because it's fun. A little bit silly too, come to that. Even if a kid couldn't care less about prime numbers, there's interest to be had in watching someone else get excited about them. We don't read biographies of people exactly like ourselves all the time, because what would be the point of that? Part of the reason biographies even exist is to grant us glimpses into the lives of the folks we would otherwise never have the chance to meet. Your kid may never become a mathematician, but with the book they can at least hang out with one.

One problem teachers have when they teach math is that they cannot come up with a way to make it clear that for some people mathematics is a game. A wonderful game full of surprises and puzzles and queries. What The Boy Who Loved Math does so well is to not only show how much fun math can be on your own, it makes it clear that the contribution Paul Erdős gave to the world above and beyond his own genius was that he encouraged people to work together to solve their problems. Heiligman's biography isn't simply the rote facts about a man's life. It places that life in context, gives meaning to what he did, and makes it clear that above and beyond his eccentricities (which admittedly make for wonderful picture book bio fare) this was a guy who made the world a better place through mathematics. What's more, he lived his life exactly the way he wanted to. How many of us can say as much? So applause for Heiligman and Pham for not only presenting a little known life for all the world to see, but for giving that life such a magnificent package as this book. A must purchase.

For ages 5-9

Oh the exuberance Paul Erdös had his entire life starting as a young child for math. It kept him busy for hours and he could not get enough. The boy was exasperating.

A fun and frolicky read. Written by Deborah Helligman, illustrated by LeUyen Pham and published by Roaring Brook Press.

#PB #biography #math #fun

I absolutely hate to write a poor review for this book as I personally loved it and also greatly respect Paul Erdos. However, this is a book that will simply confuse children.

We bought this book for our 4 y.o. son hoping it to be a whimsical introduction to the beauty of math. What we did not expect was a book about a child actively encouraged to not develop basic life skills, who was coddled by his mother, and who avoided school and social interaction to avoid germs.

Look -- I get it. Erdos's life progressed in a very unique way and the world is definitely richer for it. Again, *I* loved this book. But this is a *children's* book.

So for parents, if you are thinking of getting this book (like we were), do you really want your 4 year old learning that it is acceptable to not know how to dress him/herself, not care about eating / exercising, and not going to school?

Because, right or wrong, that's the take-away message a kid will get.

This book is about a real person, Paul Erdos (pronounced air dish), who was a brilliant mathematician and a very fascinating and quirky person. The author has created a fine work for children to learn about Mr. Erdos and the fun and interesting peculiarities of math. Mr. Erdos' influence is far-reaching. I really enjoyed learning about him.

So happy to find this book. Bright, friendly and sweet, everything is likable. I want my little niece to get comfortable to the idea of math before someone would tell her that it's something girls are not good at. She couldn't add yet, but all the unfamiliar words in this book like "multiply" or "prime" didn't bother her. This is just the right book to read to young child before the math anxiety even begin.

Great book for a content area read aloud book. Author's and illustrator's end notes have tons of information. Fact-filled and entertaining read.
Possibilities for direct instruction include text layout, deciding what's important, and building awareness of content area reading.