Paul Lockhart's Mathematician's Lament outlined how we introduce math to students in the wrong way. Measurement explains how math should be done. With plain English and pictures, Lockhart makes complex ideas about shape and motion intuitive and graspable, and offers a solution to math phobia by introducing us to math as an artful way of thinking and living.

In conversational prose that conveys his passion for the subject, Lockhart makes mathematics accessible without oversimplifying. He makes no more attempt to hide the challenge of mathematics than he does to shield us from its beautiful intensity. Favoring plain English and pictures over jargon and formulas, he succeeds in making complex ideas about the mathematics of shape and motion intuitive and graspable. His elegant discussion of mathematical reasoning and themes in classical geometry offers proof of his conviction that mathematics illuminates art as much as science.

Lockhart leads us into a universe where beautiful designs and patterns float through our minds and do surprising, miraculous things. As we turn our thoughts to symmetry, circles, cylinders, and cones, we begin to see that almost anyone can do the math in a way that brings emotional and aesthetic rewards. Measurement is an invitation to summon curiosity, courage, and creativity in order to experience firsthand the playful excitement of mathematical work.

One of the best critiques of current K-12 mathematics education I have ever seen, written by a first-class research mathematician who elected to devote his teaching career to K-12 education. --Keith Devlin, NPR's Math Guy

A brilliant research mathematician reveals math to be a creative art form on par with painting, poetry, and sculpture, and rejects the standard anxiety-producing teaching methods used in most schools today. Witty and accessible, Paul Lockhart's controversial approach will provoke spirited debate among educators and parents alike, altering the way we think about math forever.

Paul Lockhart is the author of Arithmetic, Measurement, and A Mathematician's Lament. He has taught mathematics at Brown University, University of California, Santa Cruz, and to K-12 level students at St. Ann's School in Brooklyn, New York.

Inspiring and informative...deserves to be widely read.
--Wall Street Journal

This fun book offers a philosophical take on number systems and revels in the beauty of math.
--Science News

Because we have ten fingers, grouping by ten seems natural, but twelve would be better for divisibility, and eight is well suited to repeated halving. Grouping by two, as in binary code, has turned out to have its own remarkable advantages.

Paul Lockhart presents arithmetic not as rote manipulation of numbers--a practical if mundane branch of knowledge best suited for filling out tax forms--but as a fascinating, sometimes surprising intellectual craft that arises from our desire to add, divide, and multiply important things. Passionate and entertaining, Arithmetic invites us to experience the beauty of mathematics through the eyes of a beguiling teacher.

A nuanced understanding of working with numbers, gently connecting procedures that we once learned by rote with intuitions long since muddled by education...Lockhart presents arithmetic as a pleasurable pastime, and describes it as a craft like knitting.
--Jonathon Keats, New Scientist

What are numbers, how did they arise, why did our ancestors invent them, and how did they represent them? They are, after all, one of humankind's most brilliant inventions, arguably having greater impact on our lives than the wheel. Lockhart recounts their fascinating story...A wonderful book.
--Keith Devlin, author of Finding Fibonacci

A terrific biography....The dramatic story of how the American army that beat the British was forged has never been better told than in this remarkable book.
--Doris Kearns Goodwin, New York Times bestselling author of Team of Rivals

The true story of the Baron de Steuben and the making of the American Army, The Drillmaster of Valley Forge is the first biography in half a century of the immigrant Prussian soldier who molded George Washington's ragged, demoralized troops into the fighting force that eventually triumphed in America's War of Independence. Praised by renowned historian Thomas Fleming as an important book for anyone interested in the American Revolution, The Drillmaster of Valley Forge rights a historical wrong by finally giving a forgotten hero his well-deserved due.

A joyful and intimate celebration of the beauty and creativity of algebra from one of the foremost math educators of our time.

For many of us, algebra conjures up memories of dull classes spent wondering when we'd ever have to solve a system of equations or factor a polynomial. Indeed, most of the time, if we need to plan a budget or figure out how early to leave the house for work, common sense or a quick, seat-of-the-pants approximation is good enough.

But as mathematician Paul Lockhart argues in The Mending of Broken Bones, once we stop thinking of algebra in terms of its practical applications, we can appreciate it for the beautiful and gratifying subject that it is. In his hands, algebra is the delicate craft of untangling numerical puzzles to reveal the hidden patterns and often surprising behaviors of the numbers themselves. As Lockhart traverses numerical systems, slips into and out of higher-dimensional space, and delights in the intimate connections between algebra and geometry, we come to see the discipline from his viewpoint: not as the mundane exercises of our school years, but instead as an art form whose beauty lies in its elegant simplicity.

Written in Lockhart's charming and conversational prose, The Mending of Broken Bones is an impassioned and deeply personal celebration of algebra that helps us experience the profound joys of mathematical discovery.

The fascinating (Wall Street Journal) story of how military technology has transformed the world

The history of warfare cannot be fully understood without considering the technology of killing. In Firepower, acclaimed historian Paul Lockhart tells the story of the evolution of weaponry and how it transformed not only the conduct of warfare but also the very structure of power in the West, from the Renaissance to the dawn of the atomic era.

Across this period, improvements in firepower shaped the evolving art of war. For centuries, weaponry had remained simple enough that any state could equip a respectable army. That all changed around 1870, when the cost of investing in increasingly complicated technology soon meant that only a handful of great powers could afford to manufacture advanced weaponry, while other countries fell behind. Going beyond the battlefield, Firepower ultimately reveals how changes in weapons technology reshaped human history.

The history of Sweden in the seventeenth century is perhaps one of the most remarkable political success stories of early modern Europe. Little more than a century after achieving independence from Denmark, Sweden - an impoverished and sparsely-populated state - had defeated all of its most fearsome enemies and was ranked amongst the great powers of Europe.

In this book, which incorporates the latest research on the subject, Paul Douglas Lockhart:

- Surveys the political, diplomatic, economic, social and cultural history of the country, from the beginnings of its career as an empire to its decline at the end of the seventeenth century
- Examines the mechanisms that helped Sweden to achieve the status of a great power, and the reasons for its eventual downfall
- Emphasises the interplay between social structure, constitutional development, and military necessity

Clear and well-written, Lockhart's text is essential reading for all those with an interest in the fascinating history of early modern Sweden.

This book considers the role played by Denmark's King Frederik II (1559-88) in the international diplomacy of the 'age of religious wars'. As Europe's leading Lutheran sovereign, Frederik commanded great influence; his conviction that an international Catholic 'conspiracy' threatened to destroy Protestantism led him to work towards the creation of a Protestant alliance that included both Calvinist and Lutheran states.
Lockhart examines the role of religion in Frederik's foreign policy, the motivations behind the king's alliance-building projects, and the reasons behind the ultimate failure of Frederik's policies.
This volume will be of interest to students of early modern diplomacy, sixteenth-century Protestantism, and the Scandinavian monarchies in the early modern period.

The history of Sweden in the seventeenth century is perhaps one of the most remarkable political success stories of early modern Europe. Little more than a century after achieving independence from Denmark, Sweden - an impoverished and sparsely-populated state - had defeated all of its most fearsome enemies and was ranked amongst the great powers of Europe.

In this book, which incorporates the latest research on the subject, Paul Douglas Lockhart:

- Surveys the political, diplomatic, economic, social and cultural history of the country, from the beginnings of its career as an empire to its decline at the end of the seventeenth century
- Examines the mechanisms that helped Sweden to achieve the status of a great power, and the reasons for its eventual downfall
- Emphasises the interplay between social structure, constitutional development, and military necessity

Clear and well-written, Lockhart's text is essential reading for all those with an interest in the fascinating history of early modern Sweden.