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The Soviet school, one of the glories of twentieth-century mathematics, faced a serious crisis in the summer of 1936. It was suffering from internal strains due to generational conflicts between the young talents and the old establishment. At the same time, Soviet leaders (including Stalin himself) were bent on ``Sovietizing'' all of science in the USSR by requiring scholars to publish their works in Russian in the Soviet Union, ending the nearly universal practice of publishing in the West. A campaign to ``Sovietize'' mathematics in the USSR was launched with an attack on Nikolai Nikolaevich Luzin, the leader of the Soviet school of mathematics, in Pravda. Luzin was fortunate in that only a few of the most ardent ideologues wanted to destroy him utterly. As a result, Luzin, though humiliated and frightened, was allowed to make a statement of public repentance and then let off with a relatively mild reprimand. A major factor in his narrow escape was the very abstractness of his research area (descriptive set theory), which was difficult to incorporate into a propaganda campaign aimed at the broader public.
The present book contains the transcripts of five meetings of the Academy of Sciences commission charged with investigating the accusations against Luzin, meetings held in July of 1936. Ancillary material from the Soviet press of the time is included to place these meetings in context.
The Soviet school, one of the glories of twentieth-century mathematics, faced a serious crisis in the summer of 1936. It was suffering from internal strains due to generational conflicts between the young talents and the old establishment. At the same time, Soviet leaders (including Stalin himself) were bent on ``Sovietizing'' all of science in the USSR by requiring scholars to publish their works in Russian in the Soviet Union, ending the nearly universal practice of publishing in the West. A campaign to ``Sovietize'' mathematics in the USSR was launched with an attack on Nikolai Nikolaevich Luzin, the leader of the Soviet school of mathematics, in Pravda. Luzin was fortunate in that only a few of the most ardent ideologues wanted to destroy him utterly. As a result, Luzin, though humiliated and frightened, was allowed to make a statement of public repentance and then let off with a relatively mild reprimand. A major factor in his narrow escape was the very abstractness of his research area (descriptive set theory), which was difficult to incorporate into a propaganda campaign aimed at the broader public.
The present book contains the transcripts of five meetings of the Academy of Sciences commission charged with investigating the accusations against Luzin, meetings held in July of 1936. Ancillary material from the Soviet press of the time is included to place these meetings in context.
Sergei S. Demidov, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia.
It is wonderful to have this book available in English translation.
The Case of Academician Luzin is a highly significant event in the
history of Soviet mathematics; with its presentation of original
sources, together with ample commentary, this book will now convey
the full import of this event to a new readership." - Christopher
Hollings, Oxford University, author of Mathematics across the Iron
Curtain
"The translation into English of The Case of Academician Nikolai
Nikolaevich Luzin is an important contribution toward the
understanding of the fate of a great mathematician in Stalin's
time. We learn here the details of how he was judged in a political
trial. I would like to immodestly suggest that reading this source
together with Jean-Michel Kantor's and my recent book Naming
Infinity will clarify an episode in both the history of mathematics
and of the Soviet Union that has long mystified observers." - Loren
Graham, Professor Emeritus of the History of Science, MIT and
Harvard
"Included within its 363 pages is an outline of the innovatory
nature of Russian mathematics in the first 30 years of the 20th
century. The core of the book consists of the minutes of the
meetings of the five-day hearing during which Luzin was virtually
fighting for his life. Indeed, the wealth of documentary evidence
provided by the authors creates the impression that they have left
no stone unturned in their quest to reveal the awful machinations
that beset Nikolai Luzin in 1936. Read all about it in this
gripping account of a wrongly persecuted mathematician." - P. N.
Ruane, MAA Reviews
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