Proofs from "The Book"

Proofs from THE BOOK, by Martin Aigner and Giinter M. Ziegler. Pp.199. £19. 1999. ISBN 3 540 63698 6 (Springer-Verlag). I would like to begin with the authors' words from the Preface of this book: Paul Erd6s liked to talk about The Book, in which God maintains the perfect proofs for mathematical theorems, following the dictum of G. H. Hardy that there is no permanent place for ugly mathematics. ErdSs also said that 'you need not believe in God but, as a mathematician, you should believe in The Book'. This excellent book is dedicated to the memory of Paul ErdSs. Paul himself wrote several pages but he is not listed as a co-author because of his death in the summer of 1996. The idea of the book is to present beautiful proofs of some of the most exciting and historically important mathematical theorems. The book focuses on human endeavour to make the proofs more and more simple and striking.