Hilbert by Constance Bowman Reid
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

David Hilbert (1862-1943) was one of the most important mathematicians in history. He significantly contributed to an incredibly wide range of research fields in mathematics, most notably to the foundations of mathematics and mathematical logic. Perhaps his most spectacular achievement was to formulate, in 1900, a list of 23 mathematical research problems, which inspired and influenced thousands of 20th-century mathematicians.

The author, Constance Reid, a non-mathematician, does a very good job writing about mathematics. The biography also provides a great account of Hilbert’s life, his human side, and his friendships, particularly with Hermann Minkowski. The reader will also learn how David Hilbert had made the mathematics department of the University of Gottingen the world center of the mathematical thought, before Hitler came to power and destroyed everything.

(I have the faintest personal connection to Hilbert: he had been the doctoral advisor of Hugo Steinhaus, who had been the advisor of Jan Oderfeld, who was my advisor.)

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