Nearly every mathematics graduate student has come into contact with Marvin Jay Greenberg's Algebraic Topology: A First Course text, which remains the quintessential text on
introductory algebraic topology to this day.
We celebrate this classic text with this reprint in the
memory of Professor Greenberg who passed away in 2017.
Marvin was the type of person who held his cards very close to his chest. He loved to play the ringer. I quickly moved the discussion to being about their algebraic topology course. My friends recanted stories about how the professor got stuck on a proof, how he admitted the text was unclear in many instances, how some of the exercises were monsters. As Marvin heard this, his smile grew wider and wider.
"Have you ever studied mathematics?" asked one of my friends. "A little," Marvin replied, with a huge smile.
I continued to spike the conversation. I really wound up this group of would-be topologists.
After a very hilarious 45 minutes or so, I revealed Marvin's identity. "Hey guys, what do you think of the Greenberg topology book?" "Oh my god - it's so hard! It takes me hours just to work through 1 page!" I remember a few of the comments were quite candidly negative because my friends had no idea who they were sitting with.
Slyly, I turned to Marvin, and said, "Gee Professor
MARVIN JAY GREENBERG, they don't seem to like YOUR book very much!" Marvin had the biggest smile I have ever seen on him!
