Graduate students typically enter into courses on string theory having little to no familiarity with the mathematical background so crucial to the discipline. As such, this book, based on lecture notes, edited and expanded, from the graduate course taught by the author at SISSA and BIMSA, places particular emphasis on said mathematical background. The target audience for the book includes students of both theoretical physics and mathematics. This explains the book's "strange" style: on the one hand, it is highly didactic and explicit, with a host of examples for the physicists, but, in...

This textbook is based on the author's lecture notes held at Qiuzhen College, Tsinghua University, Beijing, renowned for its rapid scientific growth of its excellent students. The book offers a remarkable combination of characteristics that are both exceptional and seemingly contradictory. It is designed to be entirely self-contained, starting from the basics and building a strong foundation in geometric and algebraic tools. Simultaneously, topics are infused with mathematical elegance and profundity, employing contemporary language and techniques. From a physicist's perspective, the...