48 Quotes by Andrew Wiles

I realized that anything to do with Fermat's Last Theorem generates too much interest.

Perhaps the methods I needed to complete the proof would not be invented for a hundred years. So even if I was on the right track, I could be living in the wrong century.

Well, some mathematics problems look simple, and you try them for a year or so, and then you try them for a hundred years, and it turns out that they're extremely hard to solve.

It could be that the methods needed to take the next step may simply be beyond present day mathematics. Perhaps the methods I needed to complete the proof would not be invented for a hundred years.

But the best problem I ever found, I found in my local public library.

That particular odyssey is now over. My mind is now at rest.

The only way I could relax was when I was with my children.

There are proofs that date back to the Greeks that are still valid today.

I know it's a rare privilege, but if one can really tackle something in adult life that means that much to you, then it's more rewarding than anything I can imagine.