Ramanujan (center) at Cambridge
Ramanujan's arrival at Cambridge was the beginning of
successful five-year collaboration with Hardy. During their work
together, Hardy found that their methodologies were vastly
different and in Hardy’s own words, Ramanujan “arrived at a
result by a process of mingled argument, intuition, and induction,
of which he was entirely unable to give any coherent account.”
Hardy, who was a known exponent of formal and rigor in analysis,
was however astounded by Ramanujan's uncanny intuition in
manipulating infinite series, continued fractions, and other
complex aspects of number theory. Based on his observations,
Hardy once made the comment: "I have never met his equal, and
can compare him only with Euler or Jacobi."
Ramanjunan’s stay in England was a boon to the world of
mathematics and in turn, he gained a reputation that he had
yearned for so much in his life. Cambridge granted him a Bachelor
of Science degree "by research" in 1916, and he was ele