Hyman Levy

Hyman Levy (28 February 1889 – 27 February 1975) was a Scottish-Jewish mathematician, philosopher, author, political activist, and fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. For many years he taught mathematics at Imperial College London, eventually retiring as Emeritus Professor.

Life Hyman Levy was born into an orthodox Jewish family in Scotland in 1889. The family lived at 70 Bristo Street in Edinburgh's South Side.

Levy attended George Heriot's School a short distance from his family home, and was named the school Dux in 1907. He studied mathematics at Edinburgh University. His leftist politics were evident early when he declined a chance for further study at Cambridge University—on account of what he considered its complicity in Britain's class system—and instead chose to pursue mathematical research at the University of Göttingen in Germany.

In 1918 he married Marion Aitken Fraser, a devout Presbyterian, After leaving NPL, he became a professor of mathematics at the Royal College of Science, Imperial College London, where he later served as head of the mathematics department, and subsequently became dean of the Royal College itself.

Levy was in the Labour Party from 1920 to 1931. He then joined the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and was a loyal member for 25 years. In 1956 he travelled to the Soviet Union and was appalled by what he regarded as the mistreatment of Russian-Jewish writers, artists and intellectuals. He published a scathing article on the subject in January 1957, and then followed that with a book, Jews and the National Question. He was condemned by CPGB leadership for his "departure from Marxism",

Hyman Levy died in Wimbledon, London on 27 February 1975, Science: Curse Or Blessing?, London: Watts & Co. (1940). Elementary Mathematics, London: Thomas Nelson & Sons (1942). Soviet Jews at war, pamphlet, Russia Today Society (1943). Elementary Statistics, co-authored with Edward Ernest Preidel. London: Thomas Nelson & Sons (1944). Social Thinking, Cobbett Press (1945). Literature for an age of science, co-authored with Helen Spalding. London: Methuen (1952); Jews and the National Question, London: Hillway Pub. Co. (1958). Finite Difference Equations, co-authored with F. Lessman; London: Pitman (1959).