For several years, Cyril Bonin's books have resonated with Tangente readers, particularly younger readers, who honoured Comme par hasard (a special mention in the 2022 PTL) and The Time Before (winner of the 2024 PTL) in the Tangente high-school prize. The author says he is "very surprised and honoured" by the interest his books have attracted when read through the lens of mathematics. He approaches this dimension of his work "as an amateur", because, in his view, the concepts he addresses "deserve to be explored in greater depth".
Excerpt from Comme par hasard.
An invitation to reflect
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Although mathematics is not central to Cyril Bonin's work, it appears alongside the broader questions running through it. The themes that "occupy much of" the author's mind are fate, free will, determinism, identity, the passage of time and the desire to control one's life. All these questions interact, converge and sometimes echo one another. Cyril Bonin says that he is particularly sensitive to the themes of freedom and identity, and asks us: "We might say that we are determined by a whole host of things (genetics, social background, education, environment…) and that we are not free. But if all those things were removed, would we be any freer? Wouldn't we simply be no one?… Unless being no one is precisely the condition for freedom."
