When Einstein Walked with Gödel: Excursions to the Edge of Thought

Where did Mandelbrot’s geometric “inner voice” come from? He suggests it may have something to do with his childhood fascination with chess and maps. He also credits the “outdated” math books he happened to get his hands on as a teenage émigré, which had more pictures than those used in school then (and today).

What struck me most, though, was the singularity of Mandelbrot’s intuition. Time and again, he found simplicity and even beauty where others saw irredeemable messiness.

The Fractalist: Memoir of a Scientific Maverick,