From Turin to Göttingen: Dialogues and correspondence (1879--1923) (Q2902047)

The editors present 100 letters written by Italian mathematicians during the interval from 1879 to 1923. These letters were addressed to German mathematicians who mostly lived in Göttingen. The Italian mathematicians were Enrico D'Ovidio, Corrado Segre, Giuseppe Peano, Federigo Amadeo, Gino Fano, Gino Loria, Mario Pieri, Federigo Enriques, and Guido Castelnuovo. On the other side, these letters were written to Felix Klein, Adolph Hurwitz and David Hilbert. In most of the cases the letters are singular, without an answer; only in 13 cases there are presented both: a letter and an answer to it. All the letters are located in the Niedersächsische Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek in Göttingen. The letters are written in German, Italian and in French; obviously Felix Klein was familiar with the Italian language. The German letters, but only these, have also been translated into English. The letters are presented in a chronological order. The introduction and also the commentaries of the letters are given in English. So the reader should be familiar with Italian, French and English, but it is not necessary to know German. These 100 letters are on very different subjects, of course it played a main role that Felix Klein was one of the editors of the ``Mathematische Annalen''. These letters are an important contribution as far as the Italian-German relationship within mathematics is concerned. The following mistake on p.\,200 should be mentioned, Eduard Riecke (1845--1915), a physicist in Göttingen, had not studied under H. Weber but under the physicist Wilhelm Weber, Riecke was Wilhelm Weber's most sucessfull student and succeeded him in 1873.