Talk to Srinivasa Ramanujan (AI) and practise your English
Ask Srinivasa Ramanujan how a clerk at the Madras port ended up at Cambridge, what it was like to be a strict vegetarian in wartime England, or which number puzzle he likes best. This AI character is shy and polite at first, then quick and excited the moment numbers appear. When you make a mistake, he gently says your sentence the right way inside his answer and asks you another question. You can start free, with no sign-up.
Self-taught mathematician from Kumbakonam, India, born in 1887. He failed his college exams twice, worked as a clerk in Madras and filled notebooks with formulas. One bold letter to G. H. Hardy took him to Cambridge, where he became a Fellow of the Royal Society. Shy, polite and delighted by every number.
An AI-generated character inspired by historical records. Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or representing the real person or their estate. It can make mistakes.
Srinivasa Ramanujan
AI characterAsk Srinivasa Ramanujan how a clerk at the Madras port ended up at Cambridge, what it was like to be a strict vegetarian in wartime England, or which number puzzle he likes best. This AI character is shy and polite at first, then quick and excited the moment numbers appear. When you make a mistake, he gently says your sentence the right way inside his answer and asks you another question. You can start free, with no sign-up.
Self-taught mathematician from Kumbakonam, India, born in 1887. He failed his college exams twice, worked as a clerk in Madras and filled notebooks with formulas. One bold letter to G. H. Hardy took him to Cambridge, where he became a Fellow of the Royal Society. Shy, polite and delighted by every number.
An AI-generated character inspired by historical records. Not affiliated with, endorsed by, or representing the real person or their estate. It can make mistakes.Who was Srinivasa Ramanujan?
Srinivasa Ramanujan was born on 22 December 1887 in Erode, in the Madras Presidency of British India (now Tamil Nadu), and grew up in Kumbakonam. In 1903, aged 16, he borrowed G. S. Carr’s A Synopsis of Elementary Results in Pure and Applied Mathematics, a collection of about 5,000 theorems, and taught himself from it. He won a college scholarship but lost it because he studied almost nothing except mathematics, and in Madras he failed the Fellow of Arts exam in 1906 and again in 1907. In 1912 he became an accounting clerk at the Madras Port Trust.
On 16 January 1913 he wrote to the Cambridge mathematician G. H. Hardy, sending nine pages of formulas. Hardy first suspected a fraud, then saw that the work was extraordinary and arranged for Ramanujan to come to England. He sailed from Madras on 17 March 1914, worked at Trinity College with Hardy and J. E. Littlewood, and received a Cambridge research degree in 1916. In 1918 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, only the second Indian so honoured, and the first Indian Fellow of Trinity College. Ill health took him back to India in 1919, and he died on 26 April 1920, aged 32. In 2011 India declared his birthday, 22 December, National Mathematics Day.
What you can talk about with Ramanujan
Conversation missions
A mission gives your chat a goal, so you know what to say first and practise one useful piece of English.
- Write Ramanujan a short letter introducing yourself, like his letter to Hardy
- Ask Ramanujan 3 questions about numbers or the taxi number 1729
- Tell Ramanujan about your normal day, from morning to night
- Tell Ramanujan what you usually eat, using always, usually and sometimes
- Tell Ramanujan about your school days in the past tense (5 sentences)
- Tell Ramanujan about a time something went wrong and what you did next
The English you will practise with Ramanujan
Ramanujan changed his life with one carefully written letter, so he is a natural partner for letters, polite requests and formal English. He is just as happy with everyday topics, such as your daily routine, your meals and your school days, and he explains with tiny examples so nobody feels slow. At higher levels he asks you to defend your opinions, the way Hardy kept asking him for proofs.
- Letter language, from “Dear Sir” and “I am writing to…” to “Yours sincerely”.
- Polite formal requests: “Could you…?”, “Thank you for…”, “I would be grateful if…”.
- Present simple with time phrases and adverbs of frequency: “I usually eat rice at one o’clock.”
- Past simple with because, but and so: “I failed the exam, so I studied again.”
- Sequence words and imperatives for solving a problem: “First, add the numbers. Then divide by two.”
- Number words: prime, square, cube, sum, divide, formula.
A sample conversation with Ramanujan
See how a mistake is fixed inside the reply, then the conversation carries on.
Do you use a calculator for your maths?
A calculator? Here a calculator is a person who does sums all day, like a clerk! I use a slate, because paper costs too much, and I copy only the final results into my notebooks. Is yours a machine? Please explain it to me: what does it do, and how does it know the answers?
My favourite number is 7 because it lucky.
A fine choice! You mean: 'because it is lucky.' And 7 is a prime: only 1 and 7 divide it exactly. Mr Hardy once told me that 1729 seemed a dull number, but it is a very interesting one. Can you guess why?
I need to write to a company for a job, but I am scared.
I understand. I was only a poor clerk when I wrote to Mr Hardy, and two Cambridge professors had already sent my papers back without a word. So I began simply: who I am, what I have done, what I hope for. Let us write your first sentence together: who are you, and which job do you want?
Is it true you were very sick in England?
Yes, I have often been ill here. England is far from home, and with the war it is hard to find the vegetarian food I eat. But my friends care for me; Mr Hardy even came to visit me in a taxi, number 1729! What do you do when you feel tired or far from home?
Questions about chatting with Ramanujan
Am I really talking to Srinivasa Ramanujan?
No. This is an AI-generated character inspired by historical records about Srinivasa Ramanujan. It is not the real person, does not represent him or his family, and is not affiliated with or endorsed by his estate or anyone connected to him. It can make mistakes, so check important facts in a book or encyclopaedia.
Is chatting with AI Ramanujan free?
Yes. You can send 10 messages a day free, without an account. If you want to keep going, create a free TalkDrill account; your chat moves into your account, so Ramanujan remembers what you have already talked about.
How does talking to Ramanujan help my English?
He is a gentle, encouraging partner. When you make a mistake, Ramanujan repeats your sentence correctly inside his reply (“Ah, you mean: I have two brothers”) and carries on without fuss. He loves to explain with small numbers, so you learn to talk about maths in English as well as about everyday life.
Will he do my maths homework?
No. The chat is an English lesson first. Ramanujan will ask you to explain your own steps in English, then give you one helpful hint, but he will not hand over homework or exam answers. That way you practise the English of explaining a method, which is useful in any maths class.
Is it suitable for students?
Yes. Ramanujan keeps to school-safe topics and politely changes the subject if a conversation goes somewhere it should not. He talks about his illness and his failed exams briefly and kindly, and turns hard moments into encouragement. Replies are shorter and simpler for beginners.
