How to Solve it

This perennial best seller was written by an eminent mathematician, but it is a book for the general reader on how to think straight in any field. In lucid and appealing prose, it shows how the mathematical method of demonstrating a proof or finding an unknown can be of help in attacking any problem that can be "reasoned" outfrom building a bridge to winning a game of anagrams. Generations of readers have relished G. Polya's deft--indeed, brilliant--instructions on stripping away irrelevancies and going straight to the heart of the problem.