The everyday blog of Richard Bartle.
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8:38am on Monday, 24th February, 2025:
Anecdote
I've just finished reading a book I was given for Christmas: Around the World in 80 Games, by Marcus du Sautoy.
I enjoyed it a lot more than I was expecting. Du Sautoy clearly loves board games, and has accumulated a large collection of them from all over the world that he's built up on his many travels. Some of them are well-known, some I've never heard of; some are modern, most are ancient; all are interesting. He often uses them to introduce aspects of mathematics, pointing out how it underlies many of the mechanics or board arrangements, which is a little preachy at times (especially if you already know the maths) but I can appreciate why he did it; he is a mathematician, after all. I could quibble with some of his historical points, and the fact that some of his "80 games" aren't actually games, but on the whole it's a nice piece of work.
I have to say, though, for someone who holds the Simonyi Chair for the Public Understanding of Science, he's really bad at explaining things.
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