NEW YORK A long-lost notebook owned by British mathematician and World War II code breaker Alan Turing sold at auction in New York on Monday for $1 million, Bonhams auction house said.
The sale of the recently discovered notebook comes at a time of enormous interest in Turing’s life and work generated by Oscar-winning movie “The Imitation Game.”
The manuscript, which sold for $1.025 million in two minutes of bidding, dates back to the mid-1940s when Turing was working to break the Nazi Enigma code at Britain’s Bletchley Park.
An original 1944 Enigma Machine, still fully operational, sold for $269,000 at the same auction, smashing pre-sale estimates of $140,000-180,000.
Both winning bids were in the room, but both buyers wanted to remain anonymous, the auction house said.
Turing was a computer scientist, philosopher and cryptologist ahead of his time who played a crucial role in breaking Enigma.
“We have no idea how many lives he saved. It is estimated that he shortened the war by two years,” said Cassandra Hatton, director of Bonhams’ history of science and technology department.
The notebook is believed to be the only extensive Turing autograph manuscript in existence and gives an insight into the man whose work, when he was just 24, led to the universal computer machine.
It features 56 pages of Turing’s notes on the foundations of mathematical notations and computer science, made during his leisure time at Bletchley Park.
It shows that Turing was examining the works of German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, and French philosopher and mathematician Rene Descartes, among others.
British actor Benedict Cumberbatch, nominated for an Oscar for portraying Turing in last year’s film, has described the prospect of being able to hold one of his manuscripts as “thrilling.”
Alan Turing notebook sells for $1m
Alan Turing notebook sells for $1m
Arts festival’s decision to exclude Palestinian author spurs boycott
- A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival
SYDENY: A top Australian arts festival has seen the withdrawal of dozens of writers in a backlash against its decision to bar an Australian Palestinian author after the Bondi Beach mass shooting, as moves to curb antisemitism spur free speech concerns.
The shooting which killed 15 people at a Jewish Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Dec. 14 sparked nationwide calls to tackle antisemitism. Police say the alleged gunmen were inspired by Daesh.
The Adelaide Festival board said last Thursday it would disinvite Randa Abdel-Fattah from February’s Writers Week in the state of South Australia because “it would not be culturally sensitive to continue to program her at this unprecedented time so soon after Bondi.”
FASTFACTS
• Abdel-Fattah responded, saying it was ‘a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship.’
• Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival.
Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
Among the boycotting authors, Kathy Lette wrote on social media the decision to bar Abdel-Fattah “sends a divisive and plainly discriminatory message that platforming Australian Palestinians is ‘culturally insensitive.'”
The Adelaide Festival said in a statement on Monday that three board members and the chairperson had resigned. The festival’s executive director, Julian Hobba, said the arts body was “navigating a complex moment.”
a complex and unprecedented moment” after the “significant community response” to the board decision.
In the days after the Bondi Beach attack, Jewish community groups and the Israeli government criticized Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for failing to act on a rise in antisemitic attacks and criticized protest marches against Israel’s war in Gaza held since 2023.
Albanese said last week a Royal Commission will consider the events of the shooting as well as antisemitism and social cohesion in Australia. Albanese said on Monday he would recall parliament next week to pass tougher hate speech laws.
On Monday, New South Wales state premier Chris Minns announced new rules that would allow local councils to cut off power and water to illegally operating prayer halls.
Minns said the new rules were prompted by the difficulty in closing a prayer hall in Sydney linked to a cleric found by a court to have made statements intimidating Jewish Australians.
The mayor of the western Sydney suburb of Fairfield said the rules were ill-considered and councils should not be responsible for determining hate speech.
“Freedom of speech is something that should always be allowed, as long as it is done in a peaceful way,” Mayor Frank Carbone told Reuters.
