Films:

Conceiving Ada

A film by Lynn Hershman Leeson about a modern-day mathmetician/computer programmer who, through MIT, gets "in touch" with Ada Byron King, the first computer programmer. With digital effects that are extraordinary for the time, Leeson addresses issues of life and death, self-will and community good with a tight crew and stage. Tilda Swinton as Lady Ada is beautiful and credible as the first prophet for computer's performing tasks outside of math. For the counter-culture's take on the movie, see Lynn Hershman Leeson, experimental artist, premieres as director of her first feature film.

Books:

The Bride of Science: Romance, Reason, and Byron's Daughter

In this critically acclaimed biography, author Benjamin Woolley portrays Ada Byron's life as the embodiment of the schism between the worlds of Romanticism and scientific rationalism. He describes how Ada's efforts to bridge these opposites with a “poetical science” was the driving force behind one of the most remarkable careers of the Victorian Age. A brilliant chronicle of an extraordinary life in math and science and an enthralling rumination on the death of Romanticism and the birth of the Machine Age, The Bride of Science offers thought-provoking insights into the seemingly irreconcilable opposition between art and science that continues to haunt us today. Order from your local bookstore or from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble.

Zeros + Ones: Digital Women and the New Technoculture

British feminist writer Sadie Plant revised the standard theory on how technology evolved by putting first and foremost women's weaving as the seminal machine that eventually spawned the PC. She especially makes much of Ada Byron King's influence and personal inspiration in her 1997 book. See her interview on what inspired her to write the book. Order from your local bookstore or from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. For a review, see Laura Lee of Brown University.

The Difference Engine

A futuristic fantasy by Bruce Sterling & William Gibson poses the question and presents a vision of what London would have been if money had been committed to Charles Babbage's Differential Machine. The algebraist worked with Ada Byron King on the first computer, which lack of funding and technology prevented from ever being built. While the authors agree that better to have dedicated the national funds to medicine than to machines, they also were the first to popularize Lady Ada's achievements. Order from your local bookstore or see Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble.

Ada, Enchantress of Numbers

A popular biography of Ada Byron, Countess of Lovelace, by Betty Toole. Order from your local bookstore or from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. For a sampling of her take on Lady Ada, please see her essay, "Ada Byron, Lady Lovelace"

Dr Anthony Hyman, author of Charles Babbage, Pioneer of the Computer, has this to say of Toole's biography:

Ada was one of the first to write programs of instructions for Babbage's Analytical Engines, the famous precursors to the modern digital computer. Beautiful, charming, temperamental, an aristocratic hostess, mathematicians of the time thought her a splendid addition to their number. Babbage warmly appreciated her worth, and the value of th e felicitous account she wrote of his Analytical Engines and their potential scope of application. The story of Ada's life and of her relationship with Babbage has been sadly distorted, and Dr Toole, who has in my view an unrivaled knowledge of Ada's life, here gives us the opportunity to set the record straight. By this Dr Toole helps clarify not only Ada's personal life, but also an important early stage of the computer revolution. I warmly welcome the publication of this critical selection of Ada's letters.