Shakespeare Club’s Meeting 13 January 2026

We don’t normally associate Shakespeare with numbers, but in his entertaining talk Rob Eastaway explained that the plays reveal that he was extremely interested in them, playing with mental arithmetic, with the mathematics of music, and absorbing the latest scientific discoveries. He put the subject into context by showing how the use of numbers changed during Shakespeare’s lifetime, and how scientific study co-existed with myth and magic. As Director of Maths Inspiration it is Rob’s job to find ways of making maths approachable, and on this successful occasion many of the audience snapped up copies of his recent book Much Ado About Numbers: Shakespeare’s Mathematical Life and Times.

Photo: Rob Eastaway