This is Stephen Hawking's personal choice of the greatest mathematical works in history. He allows the reader to peer into the mind of genius by providing us with excerpts from original mathematical proofs and results. He also helps us understand the progression of mathematical thought, and the very foundations of our present day technologies. The book includes landmark discoveries spanning 2500 years and representing the work of mathematicians such as Euclid, Georg Cantor, Kurt Godel, Augustin Cauchy, Bernard Riemann and Alan Turing. Each chapter begins with a biography of the featured mathematician, clearly explaining the significance of the result, followed by the full proof of the work, reproduced from the original publication, many in new translations.