HADAMARD (Jacques-Salomon). - Lot 135

HADAMARD (Jacques-Salomon). (1865–1963) French mathematician, member of the Academy of Sciences. Typewritten document with handwritten additions No place, no date 1 page, folio size, with 5 lines of handwritten text on the reverse. With an attached typewritten fragment containing handwritten corrections. A remarkable document on the psychology of mathematical invention An interesting document drafted as part of a study on mathematics education, focusing in particular on the phenomenon of sudden inspiration. The text presents a questionnaire structured around six questions (A through F) on the mechanisms of creative thought. On the reverse side, Hadamard adds in his own hand a particularly significant question: “Do you ever observe ‘automatic writing,’ that is, the act of writing—while thinking about something else […]—a word entirely different from the one you intended to write?” Included is a typewritten excerpt from Graham Wallas’s *The Art of Thought*, translated into French, with handwritten corrections.