The Mending of Broken Bones

As machines do more and more of the grunt work in our age of artificial intelligence, a deeper appreciation of mathematics’ intellectual artistry, and the opportunity to try it out, might be all we have left. Lockhart offers us a road to that end. Let the mending begin. – Dan Rockmore * New York Review of Books *
Suitable for teachers of algebra at any level, and for anyone who wants to understand the algebraic art from scratch. It is itself an artwork, produced by a masterly teacher. – Snezana Lawrence * Times Literary Supplement *
A most enjoyable and enlightening book. – Owen Toller * Mathematical Gazette *
The mathematical prerequisite for The Mending of Broken Bones is essentially nothing. While it aims to be useful for a more studious reader, it also aims to be accessible and entertaining to a casual reader who just wants to know how and why mathematics can be experienced as a kind of art form. I think it admirably accomplishes both of these aims.” – Thomas Hunter * Mathematical Intelligencer *
In this masterful exploration of algebra, Paul Lockhart leads us from the puzzle of solving for x to the dramatic climax of Galois theory, with fields, groups, and the unsolvability of the quintic appearing along the way. It’s a celebration of algebra’s mysteries, served up in Lockhart’s signature style: fun, precise, and irresistibly satisfying. – Steven Strogatz, author of Infinite Powers
Paul Lockhart’s books have inspired a generation of math educators to seek better ways to teach the subject—to focus on its beauty and present it in a way that appeals to our natural curiosity. The Mending of Broken Bones does this on an even grander scale, asking what it means to do mathematics and what we stand to gain from its pursuit. Lockhart’s remarkable skill is his ability to provide a compelling answer to these questions on every page. Along the way, you’ll learn a lot of math, and you’ll learn even more about math. – Keith Devlin, author of The Millennium Problems
A splendid book. A marvelous introduction to the magic of algebra. – Barry Mazur, author of Imagining Numbers

Paul Lockhart is the author of Arithmetic, Measurement, and A Mathematician’s Lament. After a career as a research mathematician at Brown University and the University of California, Santa Cruz, he spent two decades teaching algebra at Saint Ann’s School in Brooklyn.

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