For whomever might be interested in anectodes about mathematicians' personal lives:
My girlfriend's family was related to https://planetmath.org/kallevaisala and she told me this story which was part of the family lore. The family and friends were having some kind of get-together celebration maybe a wedding or so and prof. Vaisala's wife had bought him a brand new suit to look good for the occasion.
During the party they were playing croquet in the garden and prof. Vaisala got really into the game, but had the realization that suit-pants may not be the best for playing croquet. He could have stuffed the end of his pant-legs into his socks but that didn't really work, maybe socks were too tight and pants too big. So, he found a pair of scissors somewhere, and cut his pant-legs short. His wife started crying. She didn't really appreciate the genius of mathematicians.
Reminds me of the story about Weiner, who forgot he moved.
Apparently a true story, but the version where he also didn’t recognize his daughter (waiting for him at his previous home to show him to the new one) was an embellishment; at his funeral, his daughter said “dad never forgot who his children were”.
'What also surprised me in the biography was the striking difference between Jews in Italy and in Poland. [...] Leopold Infeld’s autobiography [...] describes the Jewish ghettos in Poland as being almost completely isolated from the general population. [...] She was utterly surprised when she first saw the Jewish quarter in Warsaw, remarking: “The Jews in side curls and kaftans made me feel that I was living in two different nations.'
I wonder if she was failing to distinguish between various kinds of Jews. Compare the majority of American Jews today, and the Hasidic Jews of Brooklyn, for example. This, too, was the case in Poland, home to the vast majority of the world's Jews at the time. On the one hand, there were a number of assimilated Jews and Poles of Jewish ancestry (like Tarski, Brzechwa Steinhaus, and so on). On the other, there were plenty of religious Jews of a more orthodox strain. And given that 1/3 of the population of Warsaw was Jewish, it would be difficult to imagine otherwise.
I talked to one of Zariski's students about this... He mention to me that the article said he studied ”real” algebraic geometry, which is a different subject —he studied “complex” algebraic geometry as well as algebraic geometry without a limiting adjective.
> On the day he and his fiancée Yole were getting married, with Yole already dressed in white and veiled and the rabbi standing by, the bridegroom was nowhere to be found. It turned out he was working on a mathematical problem. Luckily, Yole was neither angry nor surprised; she was amused. Ha! I need to tell this to my wife.
Fellas and ladies, get yourself a spouse who understands when you're late to your own wedding because you are inspired by your passions.
galaxyLogic ·42 days ago
My girlfriend's family was related to https://planetmath.org/kallevaisala and she told me this story which was part of the family lore. The family and friends were having some kind of get-together celebration maybe a wedding or so and prof. Vaisala's wife had bought him a brand new suit to look good for the occasion.
During the party they were playing croquet in the garden and prof. Vaisala got really into the game, but had the realization that suit-pants may not be the best for playing croquet. He could have stuffed the end of his pant-legs into his socks but that didn't really work, maybe socks were too tight and pants too big. So, he found a pair of scissors somewhere, and cut his pant-legs short. His wife started crying. She didn't really appreciate the genius of mathematicians.
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hprotagonist ·42 days ago
Apparently a true story, but the version where he also didn’t recognize his daughter (waiting for him at his previous home to show him to the new one) was an embellishment; at his funeral, his daughter said “dad never forgot who his children were”.
Show replies
lo_zamoyski ·42 days ago
'What also surprised me in the biography was the striking difference between Jews in Italy and in Poland. [...] Leopold Infeld’s autobiography [...] describes the Jewish ghettos in Poland as being almost completely isolated from the general population. [...] She was utterly surprised when she first saw the Jewish quarter in Warsaw, remarking: “The Jews in side curls and kaftans made me feel that I was living in two different nations.'
I wonder if she was failing to distinguish between various kinds of Jews. Compare the majority of American Jews today, and the Hasidic Jews of Brooklyn, for example. This, too, was the case in Poland, home to the vast majority of the world's Jews at the time. On the one hand, there were a number of assimilated Jews and Poles of Jewish ancestry (like Tarski, Brzechwa Steinhaus, and so on). On the other, there were plenty of religious Jews of a more orthodox strain. And given that 1/3 of the population of Warsaw was Jewish, it would be difficult to imagine otherwise.
Show replies
apples5000 ·42 days ago
rendall ·42 days ago
Fellas and ladies, get yourself a spouse who understands when you're late to your own wedding because you are inspired by your passions.