A Beautiful Mind

Nonfiction | Biography | Adult | Published in 1998

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Part 3, Chapters 30-33Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 3: “A Slow Fire Burning”

Chapter 30 Summary: “Olden Lane and Washington Square, 1956-57”

Staying in New York, Nash often visits the Courant Institute of Mathematical Science at the University of New York on his way to Princeton, eventually “spending at least as much time there as at the Institute of Advanced Study” (216). He enjoys the friendly atmosphere and the difficult challenges being undertaken by the scholars there.

One of the academics, Louis Nirenberg, gives Nash “a major unsolved problem in the then fairly new field of nonlinear theory” (218). Nash is soon regularly visiting Nirenberg’s office to outline his ideas, which are largely “far off the mark” (219). Despite this, his methods are as original as ever as he works “from scratch without using standard techniques” (219).

Eventually, Nash’s techniques begin to show some success, approaching the matter in “an ingeniously roundabout manner” (219) that allows him some significant breakthroughs and convinces several mathematicians that he is, indeed, “a genius” (219). However, Nash sees his research of this period as a failure because he discovers that “a then-obscure young Italian, Ennio de Giorgi, had proven his continuity theorem a few months earlier (219).

While attending the IAS, Nash spends his time “talking with physicists and mathematicians about quantum theory” (221), one time becoming so argumentative about the subject that the incident warrants “a lengthy letter of apology” (220). Nash then sets out to “revise quantum theory” (221), an effort that he will later describe as “possibly overreaching and psychologically destabilizing” (221) and present as a possible trigger for his schizophrenia.

Chapter 31 Summary: “The Bomb Factory”

After some difficulty, Nash and Alicia find an apartment in Cambridge. Nash returns to MIT and Alicia takes a job as a physics researcher. They soon settle into “the pleasant private and social rituals of a newly married academic couple” (223), frequently eating out with friends and spending evenings at “a lecture, concert, or some social gathering” (223).

Nash works on filling in the proof for the solutions he had come up with the year before, for once collaborating with other mathematicians to get the work ready for publication. His work becomes increasingly recognized and celebrated and Fortune magazine plans to include him in a series of articles about the “New Math” (224).

Despite this, Nash is “more frustrated and dissatisfied than ever” (224). He is frustrated that he has not secured a tenured position at MIT, let alone gained a place at a first-class university like Princeton or Harvard. Even his current position remains somewhat controversial thanks to colleagues taking issue with his behavior and poor teaching record.

Nash also “continue[s] to brood over the De Giorgi fiasco” (224), believing that “the sudden appearance of a coinventor [will] rob him of the thing he most covet[s]: a Field Medal” (224). The award, traditionally given to scholars under the age of forty, is considered “the ultimate distinction that a mathematician can be granted by his peers, the trophy of trophies” (225).

When the judges decide not to award Nash with the medal, part of their reasoning is that, at only twenty-nine-years-old, Nash still has plenty of time to win the award later in his career. When Nash’s mental health begins to decline, this will prove tragically untrue.

Chapter 32 Summary: “Secrets, Summer 1958”

Nash’s thirtieth birthday in June 1958 is not a time of celebration but “something far more gloomy” (228). Mathematicians often believe that “you will probably do your best work by the time you are thirty” (228). Following this, Nash’s birthday triggers “a sudden onset of anxiety, ‘a fear’ that the best years of his creative life [are] over” (228).

Alongside this anxiety, Nash experiences other strange moods, with “periods of gnawing self-doubt and dissatisfaction alternat[ing] with periods of heady anticipation” and the sensation that he is “on the brink of some revelation” (229). Both fear and anticipation encourage him to attempt to solve “the Riemann Hypothesis,” a century-old challenge often considered “the most important problem in pure mathematics” (229). The problem is famously difficult and a fellow mathematician warns Nash, “it’s a very dangerous area to go into” (232).

Nash has long been “obsessed with money, even trivial amounts” (232), to an extent that the economist Samuelson, who befriends Nash at this time, considers to be “a bit pathological” (233). In 1958, this develops into “an obsession with the stock and bond markets” and a belief that “there might be a secret to the market, not a conspiracy, but a theorem” (233). Nash begins investing his mother’s savings following his hunches about this “secret.”

Having not had a proper honeymoon, that summer, Nash and Alicia travel to Europe, driving through several countries. They both enjoy the trip although the diamond ring Nash buys from a wholesaler in Antwerp turns out to be “no cheaper than it would have been in the States” (233-234).

Chapter 33 Summary: “Schemes, Fall 1958”

When Nash and Alicia return to Cambridge, Alicia discovers “half with joy, half with dismay” (235) that she is pregnant. Nash is delighted, although a little unsure about his plans more generally, feeling considerable pressure about his future.

He is receiving offers from different universities but decides to escape the pressure of choosing by taking another sabbatical the next year, spending half his time at the IAS and half at the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques in Paris. Around this period, Nash’s investments prove unsuccessful and he has to promise to repay his mother’s savings, which adds to the pressure he is feeling.

This state of flux “may be why Nash [finds] himself drawn to another young man” (236), this time “a fiercely ambitious, enormously frustrated upstart” (237) named Paul Cohen. Like Nash, Cohen is self-obsessed and aggressively competitive and the two enjoy “challeng[ing] each other with problems” (237) and exchanging insults.

Nash does not make any direct advances but does sometimes hint at a sexual interest in Cohen, mentioning that certain people are homosexual and seeing how Cohen reacts. Nonetheless, people are soon gossiping that Nash is “in love with Cohen” (238). Later, some people will blame “disappointed love and the intense rivalry with a younger man for Nash’s breakdown” (238).

Chapters 30-33 Analysis

Nash’s work at the Courant Institute and IAS produces insights that reinforce his reputation as a genius. This is, once again, largely due to the highly original approaches he takes to solving problems, inventing new methods and adopting unexpected routes towards a solution.

However, when he decides to try and “revise quantum theory” (221), he finally meets his match, embarking on a problem so obtuse and difficult that he will later suggest that it triggered his decline into mental ill-health.

There is no immediate sign of this, however, when he returns to MIT in late summer. He and Alicia settle into “the pleasant private and social rituals of a newly married academic couple” (223) and he begins completing the proof for his recent work on nonlinear theory. He is frustrated with the speed at which his career is developing and disappointed not to receive the Fields Medal but remains more eccentric than mentally ill.

Around Nash’s thirtieth birthday, there are changes that may be seen as warning signs of impending difficulties or may be simply aspects of Nash’s already eccentric personality, again suggesting some continuity between Nash’s “sane” thought processes and his later delusions. His obsessive anxiety about aging is one such issue, as are the mood swings between “gnawing self-doubt” and “heady anticipation” (229). These polarized moods drive Nash into the “dangerous area” (232) of the Riemann Hypothesis, something he will also later suggest helped bring on his schizophrenia.

The obsession with the stock and bonds markets can also be understood as either a warning sign or simply an aspect of his obsessive nature, matching both his childhood obsession with patterns and codes and his later delusions about secret messages and hidden meanings. Again, this suggests a potential connection between his view of the world before and after his diagnosis with paranoid schizophrenia.

Despite these potential early signals of declining mental health, Nash is still perfectly capable of taking an enjoyable second honeymoon traveling around Europe with Alicia. Likewise, he is delighted to learn that Alicia is pregnant, even if Alicia herself is not quite as happy.

Coinciding with these moments of marital contentment, Nash also becomes drawn to another arrogant, competitive mathematician. Like many of his relationships with other men, Nash’s relationship with Cohen falls somewhere between love and rivalry. Like many of his early attractions to men, it is also unrequited. Along with his “overreaching” work on quantum theory and the Riemann Hypothesis, this combination of “disappointed love and [...] intense rivalry” (238) is a possible triggering factor in Nash’s impending mental breakdown.