{"id":30061,"date":"2010-08-28T07:03:36","date_gmt":"2010-08-28T07:03:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.tehelka.com\/?p=30061"},"modified":"2010-08-28T07:03:36","modified_gmt":"2010-08-28T07:03:36","slug":"the-mystique-in-his-calculations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/the-mystique-in-his-calculations\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mystique In His Calculations"},"content":{"rendered":"

A new play bravely traces the genius of Ramanujan, but does it thicken the mist around mathematics it wanted to clear, asks Aastha Atray Banan<\/strong><\/em>
\n

\"Disappearing<\/a>
Disappearing genius UK based Complicite\u2019s play recreates a lost passion for math, through the story of Ramanujan \u00a0Photo: Joris Jan Bos<\/figcaption><\/figure>
\n 
\nIF YOU\u2019RE<\/strong>\u00a0the type that puts the numb in numbers, if you ever sat in math class convinced that every passing moment was draining the very soul out of you \u2014 Simon McBurney\u2019s play, A Disappearing Number will be nothing short of a revelation. Recently staged in Mumbai by the UK-based theatre group Complicite, the plot of the story explores the unusual relationship between the legend Srinivasa Ramanujan and Cambridge University don GH Hardy.
\n<\/strong>In spite of his negligible formal training, Ramanujan is legendary for his contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series and continued fractions \u2014 in short, he was what present-day mathgroupies would describe as a rockstar. For arithmophobes, the non-linear narrative locates math in a place one would never imagine \u2014 as art.
\n<\/strong>As the play weaves through different time zones and spaces \u2014 from Chennai\u2019s bustling streets to Cambridge\u2019s quiet surroundings \u2014 it describes Ramanujan\u2019s life through music, dance and a continuous exchange of emotions through eras. \u201cI guess the story could not be told in a linear way because not much is known about Ramanujan\u2019s life, apart from his mathematics. In many ways, it defines him. One could almost say it engulfed him,\u201d says Mrudul Bapat, a professor of mathematics who took students from her BSc class to watch the play.
\nAlthough Bapat hopes that the experience will result in a renewed zest for the subject in her students, she also feels that the production mystifies math too much. \u201cHe was a genius. His math was based entirely on intuition. He hardly ever needed to put his calculations on paper. So it was quite literally like creating formulae out of the thin air,\u201d she says, adding with a pause, \u201cBut that doesn\u2019t mean all mathematicians are like that.\u201d
\nTHE MAIN body of work is interspersed with the presentday story of a globe-trotting Indian-American businessman, and his math-lecturer partner. The partner travels to India in search of Ramanujan\u2019s legacy and eventually dies in his land of birth. British actor David Annen, who plays the role of Hardy, finds the race dynamic of the story more interesting, \u201cHardy never saw Ramanujan as black or white or brown. He just saw his genius and in a way he discovered him. That\u2019s why he described it as the one \u2018romantic incident\u2019 of his life. Even the modern-day love story is so touching that it will reach out to each member of the audience.\u201d
\nFor McBurney, who describes math as \u2018the only real thing in the world\u2019, the subject is automatically enveloped in an aura of mystique. When Ramanujan, who starts out as a poor south Indian Brahmin, says, \u2018It seemed as if Narasimha was tearing out math from my guts\u2019, the viewer can almost see the creative torpor involved in the creation of something as drab as a theorem. \u201cMath is not unlike poetry or art, it involves seeing patterns in abstraction. But to appreciate its ultimate beauty, you still need to practice those formulae!\u201d laughs Bapat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A new play bravely traces the genius of Ramanujan, but does it thicken the mist around mathematics it wanted to clear, asks Aastha Atray Banan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":69,"featured_media":30066,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[21],"tags":[5725,6032,6033,6034,6035,6036,6037,6038,459,6039],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30061"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/users\/69"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tehelka.com\/rest-api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}