Mariana Cook opens her preface to Mathematicians with these sentences: “They are not like the rest of us. They may look like the rest of us, but they are not the same.” One is reminded of how F. Scott Fitzgerald began a short story: “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” To which Ernest Hemingway famously responded, “Yes, they have more money.” One is tempted to make a similar reply regarding Ms. Cook’s mathematicians—“Yes, they know more about math.”
Mathematicians is a huge beautiful book, ten inches by a foot. On the left side of each double page is a crisp autobiography by a world-famous mathematician. On the right is a superb black-and-white photograph of the mathematician taken by Ms. Cook, also the book’s editor. The volume follows the format of Ms. Cook’s earlier book, Faces of Science, about eminent scientists. She was a protegé of Ansel Adams, and her photographs hang in art musuems and galleries throughout the world. “A Couple in Chicago,” her recent portfolio featuring President Obama and his wife, is part of her ongoing work on portraits of famous couples.
Ninety-two mathematicians appear in the book under review. Over half are white male professors now in their elderly years, six are Afro-American men, and there is one black woman. Five are Asian men, four Asian women, two men are from India, and there is one handsome