Sketches in Quantitative Finance A Translation of Bachelier's Le Jeu la Chance et le Hasard

Forgotten amidst the dusty archives of French technical literature lies a delightful little gem written by Louis Bachelier in 1914 entitled Le Jeu la chance et le hasard or The Game Luck and Randomness. Popular in pre-World War I France Le Jeu... offered the general reader of the time original insights into quantifiable patterns found in both casino games and financial markets; it was perhaps one of the first how to get rich quick books. But its popularity did not survive the early 20th century upheavals in Europe and it was never translated and published into English. The book in hand Sketches in Quantitative Finance is the only known English translation of Le Jeu la chance et le hasard. It attempts to be a technically precise word for word translation of Bacheliers work preserving his original tone and his refreshingly readable (albeit quirky) style of writing. While this translations entertainment value is enhanced by the frequent nuggets of knowledge of Bacheliers mathematical perspectives perhaps the greater pleasure to the English reader will be to experience a freshly exposed artifact of scientific philosophy.