
Plaque in memory of Évariste Galois in Paris | Tangente
At last, a plaque in memory of Galois!
Passersby on the rue des Bernardins will now be able to pause and wonder at this plaque, which was missing from the capital.


Passersby on the rue des Bernardins will now be able to pause and wonder at this plaque, which was missing from the capital.


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Historian of science Caroline Ehrhardt shares her expert perspective on the life of Évariste Galois with Tangente. She casts a keen eye over the legacy—both mathematical and symbolic—of this young prodigy, who became a true mathematical “icon” long after his death.

The merging of two images, one scientific and the other political, gave rise to the image of Évariste Galois as an ill-fated mathematician—the image we have of him today. Galois did not become "famous" until the very last years of the 19th century.

Évariste Galois threw himself wholeheartedly into the political struggles of his time. His activism, republican convictions and bold acts would cost him more than ten months of his short life in prison.

Évariste Galois's name remains the symbol of precocious mathematical genius—misunderstood and tormented. Is he not sometimes called "the accursed mathematician" or "the Rimbaud of mathematics"? Retracing his all-too-short life allows us to place the young man in the context of his time.
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