Hot off the press: Newspaper in China’s Guangxi goes viral after featuring hometown mathematician

Hot off the press: Newspaper in China’s Guangxi goes viral after featuring hometown mathematician The Jul 25 edition of Guangxi Daily featured a front-page profile of hometown mathematician and Fields Medal winner Wang Hong. The headline’s layered wordplay has won praise and helped turn the copy into an unlikely keepsake. GUILIN, Guangxi: A local Chinese newspaper edition has become an unlikely collector’s item in recent days, with people scrambling to get their hands on copies and resellers reportedly listing the issue for up to 74 times its original price of 1.35 yuan (US$0.20). The reason for Guangxi Daily’s sudden surge in popularity? Its front-page profile of Chinese mathematician Wang Hong, who on Jul 23 was awarded the prestigious Fields Medal, often described as the Nobel Prize of mathematics. Wang, 35, and compatriot Deng Yu, 37, were among the four recipients this year, becoming the first Chinese nationals to receive the honour, which is handed out every four years. Wang is also only the third woman to win the Fields Medal since its inception in 1936. Handed out every four years, the Fields Medal recognises outstanding discoveries by researchers under the age of 40 and is bestowed by the International Mathematical Union. Wang and Deng’s achievement drew widespread attention across China, with news outlets reporting extensively on the historic milestone. But it was Guangxi Daily - the flagship newspaper of Wang’s home region - that struck a particular chord with readers. On Saturday (Jul 25), the newspaper ran a front-page profile piece on Wang, tracing her journey from her childhood in Guilin city to her academic career as a professor in France and the United States. Headlined “Wang’s conjecture” or “wang de cai xiang” in Chinese, the piece went viral on Chinese social media over its clever wordplay. The title plays on Wang’s surname, which can mean monarch or queen, while conjecture is a mathematical term. The article and its headline have earned praise from readers across China. As of Thursday, the original article posted on Guangxi Daily’s official WeChat account had drawn more than 100,000 likes. Interest has also spilt offline, with scalpers seeking to profit. According to local media reports, resellers have listed the Saturday print edition at marked-up prices, from 20 yuan to as much as 100 yuan per copy. Checks by CNA on secondhand marketplace Xianyu showed copies of the Saturday edition of the Guangxi Daily being sold for 15 to 25 yuan - about 11 to 19 times the original price of 1.35 yuan. Guangxi Daily on Wednesday announced a reprint of the coveted issue. In a statement published on WeChat, the paper said it has been “bombarded” with messages from people asking where they can buy the edition. The paper did not say how many copies it had sold. According to Guangxi Daily, physical copies were available for purchase on its official app starting from Wednesday at 3pm. The paper said only a limited number of copies would be made available and purchases would be capped at three copies per registered user. Checks by CNA showed that as of Thursday, more than 60,000 copies had been sold. “What everyone wants to collect, is not just the glory of Wang winning the Fields medal, but the power of words that truly touched the heart,” said the newspaper. WHO ARE WANG HONG AND DENG YU? Wang Hong Wang, 35, is currently a Professor of Mathematics at New York University’s Courant Institute, and also a professor at France’s Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques. Wang was 16 when she was admitted to China’s elite Peking University. She initially studied at the earth and space sciences school before switching to the university’s mathematics programme. After completing her undergraduate education in 2011, South China Morning Post reported that she attended France’s Ecole Polytechnique and Paris-Sud University, earning an engineering degree and a master’s degree in mathematics. She went on to earn her PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and completed her doctorate in 2019. In its Fields Medal citation, the International Mathematical Union noted, among other things, Wang’s work in “harmonic analysis and geometric measure theory”, as well as “major advances in Fourier restriction”. Deng Yu Deng Yu, 37, is currently a professor of mathematics at the University of Chicago. Also an alumnus of Peking University, Deng got his master's degree at MIT and obtained his PhD in mathematics in 2015 from Princeton University. According to his personal website, Deng grew up in Shenzhen in Guangdong province and enjoys poetry, puzzles, manga and football. In its Fields Medal citation, the International Mathematical Union noted, among other things, Deng’s work in “partial differential equations” and “probabilistic approaches to nonlinear Schrodinger dynamics”. [Image text:] H H GEANGXI DAILY MEDIA GROUP GEANGXL DAILYE GUANGXI DAILY MEDIA GROUPCO.LTD #