Alan Turing: The Enigma / A Biography (WITH ANDREW HODGES ALS LAID IN)

Hodges, Andrew

ISBN 10: 0091521300 / ISBN 13: 9780091521301

Published by Burnett Books Limited, London, 1983

About this Item

This "good-plus" volume presents nicely in its unclipped, "near-fine" original dust jacket. Copyright page states "First published 1983 by Burnett Books Limited / in association with the Hutchinson Publishing Group. . . London." Dust jacket front flap priced "L18-00 net / in UK only." Laid in are multiple newspaper clippings of original reviews of this book (presumably 1983), one by mathematician Peter Hilton, who worked with Turing at Bletchley Park as an undergraduate. Also laid in is a handwritten 1983 letter from author Hodges to Sir John Barnes, advising him that this book is forthcoming "this autumn." Bookplate of Cynthia & Sir John Barnes, Hampton Lodge, Hurstpierpoint, Sussex, to front pastedown. Copies of this small first printing of the celebrated biography of the celebrated mathematical genius credited with breaking the World War Two German "Enigma" code -- but later bedeviled by his own countrymen for his unapologetic homosexuality -- are moderately hard-to-find. Copies with autograph letters from the author, PREDATING PUBLICATION, much more so. Basis for the 2014 film "The Imitation Game," starring Benedict Cumberbatch and Keira Knightley, which won an Oscar for "Best Adapted Screenplay." The author teaches mathematics at Oxford. Alan Turing ( (1912-1954) contributed enormously to winning the war against the U-boat, largely invented the modern electronic computer, and (despite his war service) was arrested, stripped of his security clearance, and forced to undergo humiliating "treatment" for his homosexuality -- committing suicide at age 42. Totals 587 pp. including index. Reduced from $1,750. Seller Inventory # 009687

Bibliographic Details

Title: Alan Turing: The Enigma / A Biography (WITH ...

Publisher: Burnett Books Limited, London

Publication Date: 1983

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: Good

Dust Jacket Condition: Near Fine

Signed: Inscribed by Author(s)

Edition: 1st Edition

About this title

Synopsis:

VG condition book with dust jacket. DJ is clean, has fresh colours and has little wear to edges. Book has clean and bright contents.

Review:

"One of the finest scientific biographies I’ve ever read: authoritative, superbly researched, deeply sympathetic and beautifully told" (Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind)

"Andrew Hodges' book is of exemplary scholarship and sympathy. Intimate, perceptive and insightful, it’s also the most readable biography I’ve picked up in some time" (Time Out)

"A first-rate presentation of the life of a first-rate scientific mind" (New York Times Book Review)

"One of the finest scientific biographies ever written" (New Yorker)

"A first-rate presentation of the life of a first-rate scientific mind...it is hard to imagine a more thoughtful and warm biography than this one" (Douglas Hofstadter New York Times Book Review)