She displayed an aptitude for mathematics while still a young girl but her interest in formal study was discouraged by her father. She married and moved to Germany to study, but was obliged to be tutored privately since universities would not allow women to attend. Despite her gifts, she was unable to obtain an academic position for many years. She went on to become a respected figure in the European scientific community, lecturing in Stockholm, editing a new journal, organizing international conferences and winning prizes from the French and Swedish Academies of Science for her important work on the study of rigid bodies.
She lived her whole life between emotional highs and lows. And this was very evident during her seven years in Sweden. She wrote a remarkable prize-winning paper on rotating bodies, and she wrote her second novel. The novel also won high critical praise. Two years later she was deeply depressed. Then she caught flu on the way back from a trip to Moscow and died. She was only 41, but she'd really advanced our understanding of differential equations and applied mechanics.
She was the first woman mathematician in modern times to gain full academic recognition for her genius. In fact, Russia, which had been so unwelcoming during most of her life, now issued a stamp with her portrait on it. No doubt she had in some way been badly hurt as a child.
Now I cannot keep from picturing much that is joyous and good in our common future. Indeed, employing the coolest possible judgment, without childish enthusiasm, one can state almost positively that Sofia Vasilievna will become a splendid doctor or scholar in some branch of the natural sciences Sofia realised that by marrying Vladimir she could do what her sister had wanted and go abroad to enter higher education.
If unmarried, her father would not allow her to leave home to study at a university, and women in Russia could not live apart from their families without the written permission of their father or husband. So, at the age of eighteen, she married the young palaeontologist Vladimir Kovalevsky in September having, with the greatest difficulty, received her father's permission. At first things went well for Sofia living in St Petersburg and attending the University there.
She wrote to her sister back in Palibino:- Sechenov's lectures begin tomorrow; and so my real life begins at 9 a. Vladimir Onufrievich and friends will solemnly escort me by way of the back stairs so that there is hope of hiding from the administration and from curious stares Again Sofia writes to Anyuta:- I forgot to tell you that Mechnikov promised to admit me to his lectures and get permission for me to attend the physics lectures I'm studying physiology and particularly anatomy; we got a skeleton from Pyotr lvanovich Bokov and brother is poking it at this moment Two comments about this quote.
Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov was a zoologist who at this time was a docent at St Petersburg. The "brother" she refers to is in fact her husband, who she always referred to as "brother", a clear indication of their relationship at this time. Although her marriage was allowing Kovalevskaya to get the education she craved at this time, it soon caused her problems and, throughout its fifteen years, it was a source of intermittent sorrow, exasperation and tension and her concentration was broken by her frequent quarrels and misunderstandings with her husband.
Although she was now allowed to attend university lectures, her real love was mathematics and she felt that for this she had to go to Germany. In the spring of Kovalevskaya travelled with her husband to Heidelberg to study mathematics and the natural sciences, only to discover that women could not matriculate at the university.
Eventually she persuaded the university authorities to allow her to attend lectures unofficially, provided that she obtain the permission of each of her lecturers. When she arrived, Weierstrass gave her some problems to test her mathematical skill and when she solved these in a week he was immediately convinced of her brilliance. Despite the efforts of Weierstrass and his colleagues the senate refused to permit her to attend courses at the university.
Ironically this actually helped her since over the next four years Weierstrass tutored her privately. Soon after arriving in Berlin, she heard that Anyuta was in the Paris Commune, a radical socialist group that took over running Paris in March Sofia rushed to Paris where the Commune was being suppressed by the French army.
Many were wounded and killed but the two sisters escaped uninjured. Naturally, this episode made a big impression on Sofia. By the spring of , Kovalevskaya had completed three papers. Weierstrass deemed each of these worthy of a doctorate. The three papers were on Partial differential equations , Abelian integrals and Saturn's Rings. The first of these is a remarkable contribution which was published in Crelle 's Journal in The paper on the reduction of abelian integrals to simpler elliptic integrals is of less importance but it consisted of a skilled series of manipulations which showed her complete command of Weierstrass 's theory.
She was awarded the degree in absentia, writing to the Dean to explain her position:- The very reverend Dean will graciously permit me to add something to the letter in which I present myself for admission to the degree of Doctor Phil, in the mathematical faculty It is only a wish to satisfy my dearest friends I wish to give them an incontestable proof that, in devoting myself to the study of mathematics, I am following the determined bent of my nature, and that, moreover, this study is not without result.
At the same time I hope the very reverend Dean will not misconstrue me if I acknowledge openly that I do not know whether I have sufficient aplomb to undergo an examen rigorosum, and I fear that the unusual position, and having to answer, face to face, men with whom I am altogether unacquainted, would confuse me, although I know the examiners would do all they could for me.
In addition to this, I speak German very badly. Pozefsky writes in [ 83 ] :- In the couple returned to St Petersburg, foreign doctorates in hand, and embarked on a utopian scheme. They believed that their knowledge of the sciences would allow them to engage in fail-safe investing and expected their new capital to permit them to study science in tranquillity for the rest of their lives.
But the plans ended in disaster. They squandered their inheritances, fell deeply into debt Vladimir never recovered from his episode and continued, unsuccessfully, with his "get-rich-quick" schemes.
Sofia quickly recovered and wanted to continue her academic career but, now in St Petersburg, despite having a doctorate and letters of strong recommendation from Weierstrass , she was unable to obtain an academic position. This was for a combination of reasons, but her sex was a major handicap as was her enthusiasm for the nihilist philosophy. It is unclear how extreme her nihilist beliefs were for the biographies give somewhat different views.
For example in [ 48 ] Kennedy says she was In [ 51 ] Koblitz paints a picture of Kovalevskaya as a radical [ 28 ] , [ 29 ] :- Exposed to progressive thought in early adolescence, she embraced eagerly the ideas of the 'sixties, made no secret of her socialist sympathies even when they harmed her professionally, and while she never committed herself directly, she envied her radical friends their involvement in active political work, gave them her passport, accepted coded letters, and helped them out in small ways that entailed some risk.
Her rejections, however, resulted in a six year period during which time she neither undertook research nor replied to Weierstrass 's letters. She was bitter to discover that the best job she was offered was teaching arithmetic to elementary classes of school girls, and remarked:- I was unfortunately weak in the multiplication table. Unable to get a job, Kovalevskaya and her husband decided to live as man and wife rather than brother and sister. In October , she gave birth to a daughter, Sofia Vladimirovna who was called Fufa , but from increasingly returned to her study of mathematics.
She delivered the unpublished paper on abelian integrals which she had written as part of her doctoral thesis. Maxim's work took him away from Stockholm and he wanted Sofia to give up her hard-earned positions to simply be his wife. Sofia flatly rejected such an idea but still could not bear the loss of him. She remained in France with him for the summer and fell into another one of her frequent depressions. Again, she turned to her writing.
While she was in France, she finished Recollections of Childhood Perl In the fall of , she returned to Stockholm. She was still miserable at the loss of Maxim even though she frequently traveled to France to visit him. She eventually became ill with depression and pneumonia. On February 10, , Sofia Kovalevskaya died and the scientific world mourned her loss. During her career she published ten papers in mathematics and mathematical physics and also several literary works.
Many of these scientific papers were ground-breaking theories or the impetus for future discoveries. There is no question that Sofia Krukovsky Kovalevskaya was an incredible person. The President of the Academy of Sciences, which awarded Sofia the Prix Bordin, once said: "Our co-members have found that her work bears witness not only to profound and broad knowledge, but to a mind of great inventiveness" Rappaport Written by Becky Wilson, Class of Agnes Scott College An extraordinary woman, Sofia Kovalevskaya also known as Sonia Kovalevsky was not only a great mathematician, but also a writer and advocate of women's rights in the 19th century.
April References Perl, Teri. Rappaport, Karen D. Kovalevsky: A Mathematical Lesson. Koblitz, Ann Hibner. Grinstein and Paul J. Campbell, Editors, Greenwood Press, , pp Boston: Birkhauser,
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