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posts about book.

recently, in a bookstore, i stumbled about a book called the martian, which tells a story about an astronaut who gets stranded on mars and tries to survive. i really enjoyed reading it, after all the story sounds quite realistically to me. it’s a great book indeed! if you like hard scifi, it’s definitely worth reading.

one thing which was nagging on me while reading the book was that the author’s name, andy weir, sounded somewhat familiar. even though this was supposed to be his first book. well, while reading on, my suspicion grew that andy was somewhat releated to a webcomic i used to read, called casey and andy. (it’s basically about mad scientists. lots of nerdy humor!) and indeed, after finishing the book, i tried to look this up, and found out that casey and andy was written by someone called andy weir, and his homepage also features a section creative writings, where he also mentions his book the martian. bingo!

it’s really cool to see that someone who created a webcomic (one i really enjoyed!) to be (somewhat) commercially successful – after all, there are plans to make a movie out of the martian, directed by ridley scott and featuring matt damon.

today i saw a movie, called flatland, based on a 126 years old novel. a must-see for any mathematician (or must-read). it’s about politics. about thinking. about imagination.
in flatland, a two dimensional world, the third dimension is known as a myth, and it is forbidden to talk about it. there are hints, which are well-hidden from the public by the rulers. until one day, little hex went out to see these hints, and her grandfather, after having more than dream, in more than two dimensions, tries to protect her.
apparently, the movie is much easier to digest than the novel.
another reason to read that book.

[[for legal reasons, i do not want to include youtube videos here anymore. please click on this link to watch the video at youtube.]]
posted in: math movies thoughts
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