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The Poincaré–Mittag-Leffler relationship. (English) Zbl 1052.01526

From the text: The Swedish mathematician Gösta Mittag-Leffler and the French mathematician Henri Poincaré maintained a regular correspondence between 1881 and 1911. The Mittag-Leffler Institute in Djursholm (Sweden) keeps 259 of these letters (119 letters or rough drafts written by Mittag-Leffler and 140 by Poincaré). By Mittag-Leffler’s standards, this correspondence is not exceptionally voluminous. Indeed, he was almost as prolific with Hermite, Weierstrass, Appell, or Painlevé. But, for Poincaré, his correspondence with Mittag-Leffler is by far his most important. It is not clear why Poincaré, who did not collaborate mathematically with Mittag-Leffler, maintained such an intense relationship with him, and in what follows I try to explain that.
We can distinguish four periods in this correspondence. In the first one (10 letters between April and August 1881), the two mathematicians get to know each other. The creation of Acta Mathematica and Poincaré’s papers about Fuchsian functions are the main subjects of the second period (about 50 letters between August 1881 and March 1887). The third period is devoted to Poincaré’s participation in Oscar II’s 60th Birthday Competition (about 50 letters between March 1887 and July 1890). In the last period, we can see two eminent mathematicians managing nominations and positions in universities and academies and nominations for Nobel Prizes (about 150 letters between May 1891 and September 1911).

MSC:

01A70 Biographies, obituaries, personalia, bibliographies
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