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The Indian Clerk
DAVID LEAVITT

The Indian Clerk by David Leavitt
39 reviews (2007) (496p)
PEN/Faulkner Award Finalist

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Book Description
The brilliant new novel from one of our most respected writers—his most ambitious and accessible to date.
 
On a January morning in 1913, G. H. Hardy—eccentric, charismatic and, at thirty-seven, already considered the greatest British mathematician of his age—receives in the mail a mysterious envelope covered with Indian stamps. Inside he finds a rambling letter from a self-professed mathematical genius who claims to be on the brink of solving the most important unsolved mathematical problem of all time. Some of his Cambridge colleagues dismiss the letter as a hoax, but Hardy becomes convinced that the Indian clerk who has written it—Srinivasa Ramanujan—deserves to be taken seriously. Aided by his collaborator, Littlewood, and a young don named Neville who is about to depart for Madras with his wife, Alice, he determines to learn more about the mysterious Ramanujan and, if possible, persuade him to come to Cambridge. It is a decision that will profoundly affect not only his own life, and that of his friends, but the entire history of mathematics.

Based on the remarkable true story of the strange and ultimately tragic relationship between an esteemed British mathematician and an unknown—and unschooled—mathematical genius, and populated with such luminaries such as D. H. Lawrence, Bertrand Russell, and Ludwig Wittgenstein, The Indian Clerk takes this extraordinary slice of history and transforms it into an emotional and spell-binding story about the fragility of human connection and our need to find order in the world.


Other Award Winning Books by David Leavitt
THE TWO HOTEL FRANCFORTS by David Leavitt
42 reviews (2013) (272p) (NYT100)
Read Reviews | Visit this book's Amazon.com page
While England Sleeps by David Leavitt
19 reviews (1994) (304p) (LATimes)
Read Reviews | Visit this book's Amazon.com page
Family Dancing: Stories by David Leavitt
12 reviews (1984) (205p) (NBCCA) (PF)
Read Reviews | Visit this book's Amazon.com page

David Leavitt Award Stats
Major Prize* Nominations 3  
Unique Books Nominated for a Major Prize* 2  
Pulitzer Prize Wins 0  
Pulitzer Prize Nominations 0  
National Book Critics Circle Award Wins 0  
National Book Critics Circle Award Nominations 1 Family Dancing: Stories ·  
National Book Award Wins 0  
National Book Award Nominations 0  
Man Booker Prize Wins 0  
Man Booker Prize Nominations 0  
PEN/Faulkner Award Wins 0  
PEN/Faulkner Award Nominations 2 Family Dancing: Stories · The Indian Clerk ·  

*Major Prize = Pulitzer Prize, National Book Critics Circle Award, National Book Award, Man Booker Prize, and PEN/Faulkner Award

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Pulitzer Prize | National Book Critics Circle Award | National Book Award | PEN/Faulkner Award | Man Booker Prize | Contact