Rating: 
Summary: LIBRARY JOURNAL, 5/15/98
Review: "An engrossing, ultimately uplifting book for all libraries."
Rating: 
Summary: An Interesting Biography
Review: I just finished reading this book and don't have an elaborate review to share, just a small one. I chose to read the book because I recently borrowed the film A Beautiful Mind from the library. I do not usually watch modern film, but the story sounded interesting, and indeed it was an interesting film, so much so I wanted to read about this man John Nash.
First, I was surprised at how VERY different the true story is from the movie story. It was hard to get used to at first...at first it didn't seem I was reading about the same man. For the real John Nash was quite different from the Hollywood John Nash. I still am wondering, why exactly this book is called A BEAUTIFUL Mind? Is it because he was a genius at math? Personally, I didn't find him beautiful in personality...he seemed very arrogant and proud in his youth. He did not have consideration for people, not even for the woman Eleanor, who bore him his first son, nor for his wife early on, nor for his 2 sons while they were growing up. It was indeed sad to read about his illness and what it did to him for all those years. But it was nice to see he was able to overcome his illness and he also mellowed in that afterward he seemed to be able to see beyond himself. That part pleased me. Looking at the photos of him now, he appears to be a very normal man, one you would pass in the street and never think he ever suffered with mental illness. I hope for the rest of his life, he can be normal and continue to look beyond himself and care for others.
I didn't feel the book was very well written. I have read lots of biographies and enjoy them. Like other reviewers have shared, it could have told a lot MORE about John Nash. I feel there was much more that could have been told...more insights and rememberances from his girlfriend and wife, his sons, his sister, etc. The story seemed a bit "sterile", didn't let us really get to know John Nash. This style can be understandable since the author is a journalist...journalistic writing tend to be "just the facts, ma'am". I suppose in ways I am thankful for this, epecially in relation to the topic of his "homosexuality". I certainly do not appreciate biographies that throw all the distateful details of people's sins out in the open. I find that offensive. I felt this author handled this topic and a few others with decency and I appreciate that. Actually, my opinion about Nash's interest in other men was perhaps more that he displayed the actions of a confused, immature young man who maybe could not quite express his feelings of deep friendship/appreciation of other men in a proper way. But then the beach episode and the arrest there, well it seems Nash was in sin there. But maybe his illness by then was affecting his ability to act in a normal right way. (And by saying this, I don't mean to excuse his sin if it was indeed sin.)
Still, with the factual writing style, I liked the book in that I learned some new things. I have never thought about the importance of mathematics before, esp. in the military, esp. in World War II. I learned a lot about Princeton College, about Albert Einstein, about the Nobel Prize, about schizophrenia and insulin shock therapy. I am not a math whiz...only went as far as algebra in school, so all the math talked about was way over my understanding. And like others shared in reviews, I too never really got exactly WHAT John Nash got his Nobel Prize for except, if I understand right, it was for Game Theory in relation to economics. I don't feel that the importance of Game Theory to economics was ever clearly explained in the book, unless in my simpleness/lack of understanding, I missed it.
I also watched the PBS video about John Nash. That was interesting too. I think I will take the book and the film of A Beautiful Mind like I do the book and the film The Sound of Music...as really 2 different stories. I can appreciate and admire the books for the TRUE stories, and I can appreciate the films for the quite different stories they portray.
In conclusion, I say I am glad I read this book. It was not a waste of time. I learned something. But I rate it only 3 stars because of the journalistic style and lack of real depth in some areas.
Rating: 
Summary: A beautiful read
Review: This man's story is facinating. I read this after seeing the movie and it was wonderful. The book gives some deeper insight into his marriage and life as well that you'll enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: A Beautiful Mind
Review: John Nash's story is truly inspirational. I could not stop the audio until I got to the end! John Nash, a mathematical genius, had many ups and downs in his life, including a diagnosed mental illness and various social problems that made his life painful and complicated. His Nobel-prize winning work occurred while he was writing his dissertation at Princeton. He was not recognized until later in his life for his ground-breaking contribution to "game theory". His story is one not only of his incredible gift, mental illness and remission, but really one of personal victory. In the end, he learns to live in harmony with those around him doing what he enjoyed most. One of my most recent favorites!
Rating: 
Summary: An amazing piece of detective work
Review: As I have said in the title, this book is an amazing piece of detective work about the life of Great John Nash. This is by far the work that beats the movie. If you have seen it, do not stop there - read the book, because it is TRUE! If you are interested into mathematics, into the Game theory - read it, not to learn the science, but to appreciate the scientist! However, I still give it 4 stars since the level of writing drops a little after exhilarating first few chapters. Nevertheless this is a great read!!!
Rating:
Summary: a not-really-that-beautiful mathematician
Review: (hey everyone else is making a pun with their titles so why not me?) well this book has been well commented on so i'll try to keep this brief. first, it is fact that many great mathematicians develop some sort of mental illness (it happened to kurt godel, georg cantor, and even issac newton). nash, then, is not really an unusual case. what does make him interesting, then, is the fact that he had "reawakened" from his illness and continued to do math in his old age. such among mathematic circles is very rare. and his math is indeed great. nash's ability to solve problems concerning manifolds and other topological spaces is still making waves in math today. the layman unfortunately, like nasar, doesn't appreciate this fully, which is a shame. i would have liked to get a mathematician's view on johnny's life. but, as a pop bio, it's not too bad. i agree with other reviews that it contained too much minute detail, and her references to nash looking like a golden god were overstated and a bit offputting. i wouldn't be surprised if nasar was really in love with nash. (she might have dedicated her book to alicia to subdue any suspicions of that sort.) in the end, though, we see the life of one of the greatest modern mathematicians, through triumph and tribulation, which was the ultimate goal of the book. i would recommend this book to some and not to others.
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Summary: A Curious Life, A Good Movie, and Sexy Mathematics
Review: Like many others I only came to this biography through the 2001 Ron Howard movie starring Russell Crowe. Having had no clue about John Nash, let alone much about the whole "mathematical community" I was very interested after seeing the movie. I guess what captured my attention most was: 1.) the tragic nature of Nash's personal struggles with schizophrenia, 2.) his genius, and 3.) the fact that most people had never heard of him (or his influence) before. Thus, the fact that Sylvia Nasar chose to write a biography about "some boring" mathematician (and mathematical society, namely Princeton's) was a bold, and much needed thing for the general public. I've read a little about such geniuses as Albert Einstein, Bertrand Russell, and Alfred North Whitehead, but in general, anything to do with science or math just turns me cold. So, even though the movie took sensational liberties, it did help to make math sexy, and attractive for the public again. So, it was now or never for me, and I bought the biography hoping to learn more, not only about Nash, but about mathematics. On the one hand, Nash's personal life was a lot more captivating than that which the movie portrayed. While the movie simplified and dramatized certain events in his life to the nth degree, such as his "mysterious non-existent roommate", or his high-drama encounters with the "government agents", the chronology was off, and there are many real events from his life that the reader of this biography will find even more interesting and pertinent. Unfortunately, the real Nash is not as sexy as the movie portrays, and he must have been a real jerk to be around at times (he was not only a cruel child, and indifferent friend, but a cruel husband as well, leaving his first wife to the dogs). My main issue with Nasar's writing is that I didn't come away satisfied that his actual work was explained very thoroughly. The wider influence, and importance of his work (as well as other mathematicians mentioned) was too vague (i.e. after reading the biography, I couldn't tell you in great detail why Nash was great, or what his work has done to change anyone's life). Perhaps, like some of the single star reviewers out there, I'm being too harsh in my criticism of Nasar as a writer, but even though I think she portrayed his personality, and the nature of schizophrenia extremely well, she didn't seem to understand the mathematical side of things as well as she probably should have to make this a "classic" biography. Nevertheless, the lack of mathematics and game theory detail is probably a good thing in that it's lead me to seek out more serious overviews on mathematics, including one called: "The Essential John Nash", edited by Ms. Nasar and Harold Kuhn, 2002. This concise summation of his work is accessible to non-math types, and highly recommended for those more interested in Nash's work than his personal life. It's possible that you will find this compendium of his work to contain everything the biography is missing, and so, both books together probably create the most complete portrait of this "beautiful mind" available to the general public.
Rating:
Summary: This biography is intriguing and an interesting read
Review: The story of John Nash, a Nobel Prize winner, who recovered from schizophrenia after a 30 year bout with the disease. This biography is intriguing and an interesting read; if you've seen the movie, you should know that the film was really sanitized. John Nash, as a person, does not seem nice, decent or in any way sympathetic; he had strong views and treated people intimately connected with him like garbage. This is a good biography, if you are interested in finding out about a truly heroic comeback. The mathematics which are central to Dr. Nash's life are WAY over my head - but do not interfere with the actual telling of the story. One problem which occurs is the way the author writes the story - it is very choppy, but this is still an interesting read.
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Summary: Get Thee to a Profession
Review: The story of John Nash's life is clearly a story of schizophrenia, a disease whose biological causes are being increasingly indentified. It is also the story of how one choice shaped a man's life. The choice, of course, was Nash's decision to attack relentlessly a critical mathematical problem in game theory widely believed to have no solution; but whose solution, if found, entailed wide ranging non-mathematical implications. Nash turned his solution of the problem into his mathematics Phd thesis in 1950.
Nash's subsequent outstanding contributions to the mathematics of real algebraic manifolds and parabolic and elliptic equations -- which reputedly made him a candidate for the 1958 Fields Medal -- were less consequential for him personally. Because, with his success in generalizing the two-person zero-sum game in 1949 and his peculiar personality, Nash had already become a man without a profession. When his disease began manifesting itself more obviously, Nash lacked a professional home to turn to, if indeed he'd ever wanted one. Not only did mathematicians and economists within Nash's specialty area know him to not be a good toiler in their fields, a loner whose eye was always on the prize, Nash was simply an "unclassifiable life form" to almost everyone, long before he started haunting Princeton's halls in those purple sneakers.
How many other crazy mathematicians have quietly retired and been looked after by their professional colleagues? No doubt, a set considerably large, by any but a mathematician's definition...
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