Proof Understanding: E Normed space, F Banach space implies $L(E,F)$ is a Banach Space..

banach-spacesfunctional-analysis

I am working through Hueser's Functional Analysis and have come across the proof (7.4) that:

If E is a normed space and F is a Banach space then $L(E,F)$, the set of continuous linear transformations from E to F is a Banach space.

The proof constructs a Cauchy sequence of operators and uses the fact that F is a Banach space to arrive at the result:

\begin{equation} ||A_nx-Ax|| < \epsilon||x|| \end{equation}

Where $A_nx \rightarrow Ax$ in F and $\{A_j\}$ constitutes a Cauchy sequence of operators.

My confusion arises as to how this implies $A_n \rightarrow A$ as the author's just arrives at this result in the next line with no explanation.

My idea is that because $Ax$ is linear and continuous and E is a Vector space so contains the identity therefore set $x=1$ and get the result.
However any clarification or hints would be appreciated.

Best Answer

To show that $A_n \to A$ in $L(E,F)$, we need to show that $||A_n - A|| \to 0$, which is equivalent to saying that for any $\epsilon > 0$, there exists $N$ such that if $n > N$ , we have $||A_n - A|| < \epsilon$.

However, $||A_n - A|| < \epsilon$ is the same as $||(A_n - A)x|| < \epsilon ||x||$ for all $x \in E$ , which is the same as $||A_n x - Ax|| < \epsilon ||x||$ for all $x \in E$, which is the statement you have.

In other words, the last statement is the assertion that $||A_n - A|| < \epsilon$, which was to be shown for showing $A_n \to A$. This equivalence was omitted in the text since it nearly follows by definition.

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