Colorado Mathematical Olympiad: The First Ten Years and Further Explorations [Paperback]

Alexander Soifer (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 189 pages
• Publisher: Center of Excellence in; 1st edition (June 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0940263033
• ISBN-13: 978-0940263031
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #4,596,068 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I was once born in Moscow to the family of a painter and an actress. There I received my music and math education, became a "Moscow intellectual", and as such I felt a burning desire of freedom - freedom personal, political, and creative.
Half a life ago, I left the familiar landscape in search of freedom. I found it in the United States. In a curious way, I repeated the American history in my personal life. In 1978 I came to Plymouth Rock, by then called Boston. I wintered there, and moved west. I crossed the whole country from Boston to Los Angeles in a covered wagon with "U-Haul" written on its side. It leaked quite authentically! In Los Angeles, I made a U-Turn in my U-Haul, and returned to the picturesque Colorado to take a new job.
I have been a professor at the University of Colorado ever since, for 30 years, with a recent 3-year long excursion to Princeton and Rutgers universities. I have taught courses in math, such as "What is Mathematics?", "Mathematical Coloring Course", "Mathematics: A Human Endeavor". I have also taught "Russian Avant-Garde Art of the Early XX Century" and many European film courses, such as "Andrzej Wajda and Cinema of Poland", "Michelangelo Antonioni and Post W.W.II Cinema of Italy", "Russian Cinema Today."
I write books touching on mathematics, history, biography, and art. All my present and near-future books will be published by Springer. 18-year long investigation into Ramsey Theory and the lives of its creators resulted in what truly could be called the book of my life, "The Mathematical Coloring Book:

http://www.springer.com/math/numbers/book/978-0-387-74640-1

Next to come out in Springer are:
*) "Mathematics as Problem Solving"
**) "How Does One Cut a Triangle?"
***) "Geometric Etudes in Combinatorial Mathematics"
****) "Life and Fate: In Search of Van der Waerden"
*****) "Problems of pgom Erdos" - a joint book with my legendary late friend, coauthor and friend Paul Erdos.

I will then write books that do not yet have a publisher:

*) "On Both Sides of the Atlantic: Adventures of a Mathematician."
**) "Memory in Flashback" - a book of maxims in the style of Hugo von Hofmannsthal's 1922 "Buch der Freunde."

The 1-year old collie Pastushok ("Little Sheppard") lives with me. We are musing that one day we will be joined by our Muse :-).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Judge for Yourself!, April 12, 2006

By 

Alexander Soifer (Colorado Springs, CO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Colorado Mathematical Olympiad: The First Ten Years and Further Explorations (Paperback)

Best information comes from objective extended journal reviews. See

them for yourself at

http://www.uccs.edu/~asoifer/

I hope you would enjoy reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it!

(This is all I meant to say, but amazon.com required a "rating in stars" in order to receive these lines -- I am not a judge, you are! So read and enter your verdict.)

1 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exceptional book!, March 18, 2002

By 

Bill Young (Northglenn, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Colorado Mathematical Olympiad: The First Ten Years and Further Explorations (Paperback)

I've taken the Olympiad exams as a high school student, and helped grade the exams after high school. The explanations of the problems are exceptional. I'm honored to have met Dr. Soifer. ...