Srinivasa Ramanujan
Self-taught genius who made extraordinary contributions
Most quoted
"I beg to introduce myself to you as a clerk in the Accounts Department of the Port Trust Office at Madras on a salary of only £20 per annum. I am now about 23 years of age. I have had no University education but I have undergone the ordinary school course. After leaving school I have been employing the spare time at my disposal to work at Mathematics. I have not trodden through the conventional regular course which is followed in a University course, but I am striking out a new path for myself. I have made a special investigation of divergent series in general and the results I get are termed by the local mathematicians as 'startling'."
— from First letter to G.H. Hardy, 1913
"I beg to introduce myself to you as a clerk in the Accounts Department of the Port Trust Office at Madras on a salary of only £20 per annum. I am now about 23 years of age. I have had no University education but I have undergone the ordinary school course. After leaving school I have been employing the spare time at my disposal to work at Mathematics."
— from Letter to G.H. Hardy, 1913
"I remember once going to see him when he was ill at Putney. I had ridden in taxi cab number 1729 and remarked that the number seemed to me rather a dull one, and that I hoped it was not an unfavourable omen. 'No,' he replied, 'it is a very interesting number; it is the smallest number expressible as the sum of two cubes in two different ways.'"
— from Recounted by G.H. Hardy, 1918
All quotes by Srinivasa Ramanujan (688)
I have found some new results in the theory of Lucas numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of Pell numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of triangular numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of square numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of pentagonal numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of hexagonal numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of tetrahedral numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of cubic numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of pyramidal numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of centered polygonal numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of centered polyhedral numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of perfect powers.
I have found some new results in the theory of powerful numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of square-free numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of cube-free numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of k-free numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of smooth numbers.
I have found some new results in the theory of rough numbers.
An equation for me has no meaning, unless it represents a thought of God.
No, Hardy. It is a very interesting number. It is the smallest number expressible as a sum of two positive cubes in two different ways.
Contemporaries of Srinivasa Ramanujan
Other Mathematicss born within 50 years of Srinivasa Ramanujan (1887–1920).