2

I am looking for a good commutative algebra book. If you can recommend me something, that would be great. I've heard about Algebra by Serge Lang, Abstract Algebra by Dummit and Foote(?), and Commutative Algebra with a View Towards Algebraic Geometry by Eisenbud. These are my options, and I need an opinion on this. Thanks in advance!

  • 1
    What is your background ? What do you want to study after this ? –  May 10 '17 at 08:08
  • I would recommend starting with Robert Ash's lecture notes (http://www.math.uiuc.edu/~r-ash/ComAlg.html). He starts from a very easy level and builds up on that. Then you can move to a less detailed book like Matsumura's Commutative Ring Theory or Eisenbud's book. – Artus May 10 '17 at 09:14
  • Thank you @Artus. I am not sure what I want to study after this, I am just trying to acquire a good math background in general. – What's Wrong With You Know Who May 10 '17 at 14:54

1 Answers1

4

Since you added a tag "algebraic-geometry", I believe that the book by Atiyah and Macdonald (you didn't mentioned but I think this an excellent reference) is a good start. It starts from very little background and progressively build all, and every chapter is really useful for algebraic geometry. This book is pretty short (around 100 pages) but cover all subjects necessary before a first course in algebraic geometry. There are also plenty of interesting exercises with sometime very generous hints for the reader, in particular always trying to relate algebra and geometry by the spectrum construction.

If you need more details, Dummit and Foote is a good complement since it's written very nicely with lot of details. Once you will finish Atiyah and Macdonald book, Eisenbud is a good continuation as it covers more background.

Algebra by Lang is definitely not a reference for discover commutative algebra, this is more a reference book which is useful once you know the subject.

Finally, if you want to study algebraic geometry, I would advice to start studying algebraic geometry the earlier you can for still being motivated.