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Abel, the Mozart of Mathematics

“Although Abel shared with many mathematicians a complete lack of musical talent, I will not sound absurd if I compare his kind of productivity and his personality with Mozart’s.” — Felix Klein

He applied to the Royal Frederick University for funds to publish it, but despite the support of his patrons Professor Rasmussen and Hansteen, the committee did not immediately approve the grant and the paper was eventually lost. I can scarcely repress the wish, that the time and the mental powers of the head which Mr. A. blesses us with, not be utilized, from my perspective, on sterile subject matter, but ought rather be applied to a theme, whose edification would have the most important consequences for the whole analysis and its application to dynamic explorations: I am thinking of the elliptical transcendents. With the proper approach to investigations of this type, serious scrutiny by no means becomes static, nor do the highest and more remarkable functions, with their many and handsome properties, become something in and for themselves, but rather, it is going to reveal the Magellan-Voyages to great regions of one and the same immense analytic ocean.

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