The chairman of the MIT mathematics department, Martin offers John Nash an instructorship at the university in the 1950s. Martin is a “loquacious” mathematician known for luring “young hotshots” to the department. At the height of the McCarthy era during the Cold War (a period in which the aggressively anti-communist U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy led a committee to weed suspected Communists and Soviet spies out of the U.S.), Martin’s “secret past” as an underground member of the Communist Party in the late 1930s and early 1940s is exposed.
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William Ted Martin Character Timeline in A Beautiful Mind
The timeline below shows where the character William Ted Martin appears in A Beautiful Mind. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 16 – MIT
...beginning to attract top-tier talent, thanks to the work of the mathematics chairman, William Ted Martin. Martin is known for “lur[ing] young hotshot” researchers like Nash to MIT to improve the...
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Chapter 20 – Geometry
In the early part of 1953, Martin offers Nash a permanent faculty position at MIT, which comes as a surprise to faculty...
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Chapter 35 – In the Eye of the Storm
...therapy. In January, Nash is approved for tenure but relieved of his teaching duties, since Martin is aware that Nash seems to be suffering a “nervous breakdown.” Alicia begins to wonder...
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