Enigma

“The Imitation Game” tells the story of Alan Turing, a British mathematician who was born in 1912 and played a key role in the Allies winning World War II by deciphering “Enigma,” a communication code used by the German army. Besides being quite brilliant and more than a little eccentric, he was also a homosexual at a time when such behavior could result in criminal charges with harsh consequences.

His eccentricities came as no surprise to this one-time undergraduate mathematics major. One of Barry’s amusing pass times when we were undergraduates together at the University of Rochester was to watch the assortment of students leaving the lecture halls when he came to meet me after classes in theoretical mathematics. With all our quirks, we applied statisticians cannot hold a candle to the theoretical mathematics and physics students in lack of sophistication.

Sadly, unlike the “live and let live” attitude that is prevalent in most western countries today, life for homosexuals in previous centuries could be quite unpleasant. When Turing was convicted of “indecency” in 1952, he was offered the choice between a prison term and chemical treatment, and chose the latter. Two years later he took his own life.

Perhaps things would have been different if he had worked on something for which he could have immediately been recognized. But as he quickly pointed out when the code was finally broken, the accomplishment needed to continue to be kept secret, because as soon as the Germans would have known the Allies were able to intercept their messages, they would have developed a new code. I am certainly no Turing: I did not even see that coming!

There was one line in the film that found me pulling a pen and scrap of paper out of my purse:

“Sometimes it is the people no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine.”

If you type this line into Google you see that it is a very popular quote from the movie. While the sentiment is quite inspiring, it would have been nice if the writers had steered clear of that phrase ending in a preposition (“the people no one imagines anything of”) and instead written:

“Sometimes it is the people of whom no one imagines anything who do the things that no one can imagine.”

Either way, it was an excellent film, and we thank our friends who recommended it.

The upcoming week is relatively quiet, and I hope to spend a few days working on my 2014 family picture book, always a fun project.

Meanwhile, stay warm!

Love,

Rebecca