Elementary geometry of algebraic curves: an undergraduate introduction

Abstract

This is a genuine introduction to plane algebraic curves from a geometric viewpoint, designed as a first text for undergraduates in mathematics, or for postgraduate and research workers in the engineering and physical sciences. The book contains several hundred worked examples and exercises, making it suitable for adoption as a course text. From the lines and conics of elementary geometry the reader proceeds to general curves in the real affine plane, with excursions to more general fields to illustrate applications, such as number theory. By adding points at infinity the affine plane is extended to the projective plane, yielding a natural setting for curves and providing a flood of illumination into the underlying geometry. A minimal amount of algebra leads to the famous theorem of Bezout, whilst the ideas of linear systems are used to discuss the classical group structure on the cubic.