michael_nielsen

Twitter: I want to get better at maths, to make up for lost time in college. Who/what should I read?

But trying the proof directly can work for relatively "easy" results, based on a few manipulations and one, as much two clever ideas. But many results have been the product of lots of brilliant ideas, work, etc. If you're a beginner in the field, you can hardly distinguish.

Yes. There were many results where I failed, or where it took repeated attempts over months or years. There are a few results where I succeeded after more than two decades.

It also, I might add, makes "reading" incredibly slow. I'd often be stuck for a few hours trying to prove some lemma or another. Eventually I'd give up and move on (surprisingly often, though, I'd later see the proof very quickly).