Kepler by John Banville
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read this fictionalized biography of Johannes Kepler, the most important astronomer and mathematician of the early 17th century, with considerable interest. Kepler's laws of planetary motion are a standard topic of the Calculus III course, which I frequently teach. John Banville, the author, is one of my favorite writers (I rated two of his novels, The Untouchable and The Sea, with five stars). However, my feelings about Kepler are quite mixed.

I adore the way Banville explains the astronomer's mathematical work. Kepler embarks on a quest to find a mathematical model that would best fit the experimental data, which could be used as a definition of the main goal of data science. The following fragment neatly characterizes the method of mathematical modeling: "The real mystery & miracle is not that numbers have effect upon things (which they do not!), but that they can express the nature of things; that the world, vast & various & seemingly ruled by chance, is amenable in its basic laws to the rigorous precision & order of mathematics."

The astronomer's quest to find these laws succeeded. Banville writes about Kepler's discovery: "The conclusion was, simply, that the planet's path curves inward on both sides, and outwards again at opposite ends. This oval figure, I readily admit, terrified me. It went against that dogma of circular motion, to which astronomers have held since the first beginnings of our science." That the shape of planets' trajectories is elliptical became Kepler's first law of planetary motion.

However, although Banville's prose is, as usual, wonderful, I have reservations about a literary device used by the author. A long period of Kepler's middle-age years is presented via his letters to fellow astronomers, friends, family, and others. To me, not only does it diminish the consistency of the narrative, but also the fact that the letters are fictitious while actual letters are available (for instance, in the Oxford University catalogue) reduces the credibility and impact of the story. Maybe I am overreacting; maybe when I completely digest my reading of this biography, I will change my mind and assign it a higher rating.

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