Simon Norton, mathematical prodigy who became the subject of the biography ‘The Genius in my Basement’ – obituary

CRANK

Simon Norton, who has died from a heart condition aged 66, was an Eton-educated maths prodigy considered one of the greatest minds of the 20th century – until the mid-1980s, when he lost his position at Cambridge University and ended up living in squalor in a dingy Cambridge basement packed with bulging plastic bags and piles of bus timetables, living on a diet of tinned mackerel, Bombay mix and brinjal pickle.