The Magic of Math is the math book you wish you had in school. Using a delightful assortment of examples—from ice cream scoops and poker hands to measuring mountains and making magic squares—this book empowers you to see the beauty, simplicity, and truly magical properties behind those formulas and equations that once left your head spinning. You’ll learn the key ideas of classic areas of mathematics like arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus, but you’ll also have fun fooling around with Fibonacci numbers, investigating infinity, and marveling over mathematical magic tricks that will make you look like a math genius!

A mathematician who is known throughout the world as the “mathemagician,” Arthur Benjamin mixes mathematics and magic to make the subject fun, attractive, and easy to understand. In The Magic of Math, Benjamin does more than just teach skills: with a tip of his magic hat, he takes you on as his apprentice to teach you how to appreciate math the way he does. He motivates you to learn something new about how to solve for x, because there is real pleasure to be found in the solution to a challenging problem or in using numbers to do something useful. But what he really wants you to do is be able to figure out why, for that’s where you’ll find the real beauty, power, and magic of math.

If you are already someone who likes math, this book will dazzle and amuse you. If you never particularly liked or understood math, Benjamin will enlighten you and—with a wave of his magic wand—turn you into a math lover.

擁有約翰·霍普金斯大學的博士學位，任美國哈維姆德學院的數學教授。本傑明長期從事寫作與教學工作，榮獲多個奬項。他還是美國數學協會主辦的《數學地平綫》（Math Horizons）雜誌的編輯。他做過三次TED演講，演講視頻的觀看人數超過1 000萬。美國《讀者文摘》（Reader’s Digest）稱他為“美國最傑齣的數學專傢”。他與妻子及兩個女兒住在美國加利福尼亞的剋萊濛特市。