Lambert series, false theta functions, and partitions (Q1846896)

The generalisation of the Rogers-Ramanujan identities due to \textit{B. Gordon} [Am. J. Math. 83, 393--399 (1961; Zbl 0100.27303)] involves the function \(B_{k,a}(N)\) which can be interpreted as the number of partitions of the form \(N = \sum if_i\) where \(f_1\le a - 1\), \(f_i + f_{i+1}\le k-1\). In this paper a similar function \(W_{k,i} (n;N)\) is considered; \(W_{k,i} (n;N)\) is the number of partitions of the form \( N= \sum_{j=1}^n jb_j\) with \(b_1 = i\), \(b_j\le k-1\) and \( b_j + b_{j+1} = k\) or \(k+1\) for \(1\le j\le n - 1\). The generating function \(\omega_{k,i}(n;q)\) is investigated. A special case of the general result obtained is \[ \sum_{n=1}^\infty q^{(2k-1)n^2/2 - n/2} (1-q^n) = \sum_{n=1}^\infty \frac{(-1)^{n-1} \omega_{k,k-1}(n;q)} {(1+q)(1+q^2)\cdots (1+q^n)} \] which, when \(k=2\), is an old result of \textit{L. J. Rogers} [Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. (2) 16, 315--336 (1917; JFM 46.0109.01)].