Introduction: Relationships and Connections Between Literature and Mathematics

Abstract

This chapter introduces the five parts of the Handbook and charts the development of the field of Literature and Mathematics Studies. It sets out the rationale of dividing the chapters into five parts and provides context and scholarship on the topics: Mathematics in Literature; Mathematics and Literary Form; Mathematics, Modernism, and Literature; Relations between Literature and Mathematics; and Mathematics as Literature. The second part of this introductory chapter charts the development of the study of literature and mathematics, with reference to the broader field of literature and science studies. It highlights the specificity of mathematics as a discipline and field of knowledge and emphasizes the particular position of mathematics in research on the historical, social, and cultural dimensions of science.

CLASSICS STRIKES BACK: THOMAS EVANS AND HISMATHEMATOGONIA

“…22For Coleridge and the tradition, see Wiegand (2013), and for the tradition itself, Brown (2013, 2020). Abbott was Senior Classic in 1861.…”