Cambridge Encyclopedia :: Cambridge Encyclopedia Vol. 40

John (Edensor) Littlewood

Mathematician, born in Rochester, Kent, SE England, UK. He studied at Cambridge, lectured in Manchester (1907–10), then returned to Cambridge as a fellow of Trinity, and remained there for the rest of his life. In collaboration with Godfrey Hardy, he wrote papers on summability theory, Tauberian theorems, Fourier series, analytic number theory, and the Riemann zeta-function. He was appointed to the chair of mathematics at Cambridge in 1928.

John Edensor Littlewood

J.E. Littlewood
Born June 9, 1885
Rochester, Kent, England
Died September 6, 1977
Cambridge, England
Residence UK
Nationality British
Field Mathematician
Institution University of Cambridge
Alma Mater University of Cambridge
Doctoral Advisor Ernest William Barnes
Doctoral Students Sarvadaman Chowla
Harold Davenport
Donald C. Spencer
Known for Mathematical analysis

John Edensor Littlewood (9 June 1885 – 6 September 1977) was a British mathematician.

Most of his work was in the field of mathematical analysis.

He coined Littlewood's law, which states that individuals can expect miracles to happen to them, at the rate of about one per month.

He continued to write papers into his eighties, particularly in analytical areas of what would become the theory of dynamical systems.

He is also remembered for his book of reminiscences, A Mathematician's Miscellany (new edition published in 1986).

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