Parsing "…including a problem…, in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own 'fleeting vain attempts' to resolve it"

Question

Prologue to a book which I was reading ends with this verbatim copy-pasted text:

A book should be dedicated to someone living, so that the dedication can give pleasure. I have dedicated this book to my wife, who knows very well how sincere that dedication is. There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann, who, in a short life blighted with much misfortune, gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after, in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

John Derbyshire — Prime Obsession: Bernhard Riemann and the Greatest Unsolved Problem in Mathematics pub. National Academies Press, 2003

I get what John Derbyshire wants to say, though I wonder whether there is something somewhat wrong with the third sentence, starting with "There is" & ending with "resolve it": I am unable to parse it satisfactorily.
(The issue starts with the unexpected "he noted" , which seems jarring.)

I could simplify it like this:

There is a sense in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value, including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after in a characteristically diffident aside he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

Parsing that requires simplifying further, though I have to make it 2 Sentences.

Parseable Version 1 :

This book belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave a problem , in a characteristically diffident aside.
He noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

Parseable Version 2 :

This book belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave a problem.
In a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

Both are historically valid :
Bernhard Riemann gave a Problem in a diffident aside.
Bernhard Riemann noted his attempts in a diffident aside.

Either way , the Original third Sentence looks ungrammatical & making it 2 Sentences makes it grammatical.

I have a third way to make it grammatical by adding a conjunction "and" between the 2 Sentences.

Parseable Version 3 :

This book belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave a problem and noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

I have this last ( no more edits from my side !! ) fourth way to make it grammatical by making it a relative clause.

Parseable Version 4 :

This book belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave a problem , for which he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” at resolution.

Questions:

Is my thinking right about the original sentence missing out a word or two (at least missing the conjunction) or somewhat mixing up the structure?
Alternately: Is there a way to parse the original sentence to show that it too is grammatically correct?

Answer 1

There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann, who, in a short life blighted with much misfortune, gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after, in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

There is no problem in parsing this sentence before the last part ("in a characteristically… resolve it").

• 1 There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue [main clause]

  • 2 in which [sense] this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann [relative clause]

    • 3 who [Riemann], in a short life blighted with much misfortune, gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem [relative clause (embedded in preceding relative)]

      • 4 that [problem] continues to vex them a century and a half after [relative clause (embedded in preceding relative)]

5 in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

It appears that it is the "fleeting vain attempts" that are made in a "diffident aside"; that is, the sentence cannot be read as "the "problem is given in a diffident aside". Somehow the adverbial "in a characteristically…" is too far from the verb "give" for it to apply to the clause of that verb. Moreover, here is what the author says in his work, "Prime Obsession" (p. 151).

The 1859 paper “On the Number of Prime Numbers Less Than a Given Quantity” was Bernhard Riemann’s only publication on number theory, and the only one of his productions that contained no geometrical ideas at all. The paper, though dazzling and seminal, was in some respects unsatisfactory. There was, first of all, the great Hypothesis, which Riemann left hanging in the air (where it still hangs). His actual words, after making a statement that is equivalent to the Hypothesis, were

One would, of course, like to have a rigorous proof of this, but I have put aside the search for such a proof after some fleeting vain attempts (einigen flücht igen vergeblichen Versuchen) because it is not necessary for the immediate objective of my investigation.

The aside is then within the paper consecrated by Riemann to the problem. In consequence, the clause "in a char… it" is really an extrapolated clause within the extrapolated prepositional phrase "including…"; however, embeddings of extrapolated elements within other extrtapolated elements are not in use in English; that is the sentence would never be written as follows (also, the second dash is ambiguous: it can be read as the end of the extrapolated prepositional phrase).

There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann, who, in a short life blighted with much misfortune, gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after—in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it——.

The author's sentence is deficient then in respect of the punctuation of the last part. An alternative that would keep the whole of the sentence a self contained unit consist in making the separation less interruptive by replacing it by a comma, and then using the m-dash after "after".

There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann, who, in a short life blighted with much misfortune, gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value, including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after— in a characteristically diffident aside, he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

Answer 2

The parse is:

There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann, who [, in a short life blighted with much misfortune,] gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after [,in a characteristically diffident aside,] he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

Without parentheticals:
There is a sense, though, not to be left unremarked in a prologue, in which this book most properly belongs to Bernhard Riemann who gave to his fellow men so very, very much of everlasting value—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after he noted his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.

The sentence is fine.

Answer 3

The very last chunk should read

—including a problem that continues to vex them a century and a half after he had noted, in a characteristically diffident aside, his own “fleeting vain attempts” to resolve it.