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Young World
Against all odds
EDWARD DRAKE
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Despite the pitfalls, Ramanujan never gave up.
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Photo: The Hindu Photo Library
April 26 will be the 88th death anniversary of Srinivasa Ramanujan, one of the greatest Mathematicians of the 20th century. He was born in 1887 in Erode. Ramanujan’s teachers realised that he was good in maths . Every time they started to teach him something they found that he had already discovered it! His fascination for maths, didn’t allow him time for other subjects. This became a probl
em and he had to leave college. He failed in all subjects except maths.
Work with Hardy
After leaving college Ramanujan had hardly enough money. He didn’t have a degree, so nobody thought he could be a good mathematician.
Ramanujan sent letters to several famous mathematicians in India and in England showing the difficult puzzles he was solving. Two of the professors sent the letters back to him without even saying that they had read them!
Fortunately Ramanujan didn’t give up. After years of sending letters, G.H. Hardy, a maths professor at Cambridge University read one and realised how clever Ramanujan was. Hardy paid for Ramanujan to travel to England and by working together they made many advances in maths. Lots of the work done by Ramanujan and Hardy is still being studied at universities today.
We can still learn from Ramanujan’s life. Even though everyone around him doubted what he was doing, Ramanujan had perseverance. Ramanujan never gave up.
Be inspired by maths, visit www.heymath.com
The author is a Cambridge Mathematics Graduate currently working at HeyMath!
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