Raymond Queneau, founderof Oulipo, was inspired inhis literary experimentationby the forms and patterns ofmathematics. In a nice bit ofreciprocity, John McCleary’sExercises in (Mathematical) Stylewas inspired by Queneau’s Exercisesin Style. Queneau tells 99versions of the same—meaningless, uninteresting—storyof an encounter on a bus in 99 stylistically distinct ways.McCleary tells 99 stories of the binomial coefficients in avariety of voices, styles, and forms. McCleary’s stories havethe advantage that they are not uninteresting and are notall the same; it’s not just style, it’s substance, too.
展开▼
