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The Professor and his Pupil are having a math lesson as part of her
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Start: PROFESSOR: She exaggerates. Her fears are stupid. But let’s return to our arithmetical knitting.
PUPIL: I’m following you, Professor.
PROFESSOR: [wittily] Without leaving your seat!
PUPIL: [appreciating his joke] Like you, Professor.
[... … …]
End: PROFESSOR: … It is by mathematical reasoning, simultaneously inductive and deductive, that you ought to arrive at this result - as well as any other result. Mathematics is the sworn enemy of memory, which is excellent otherwise, but disastrous, arithmetically speaking! ...That’s why I’m not happy with this… This won’t do, not at all…
PUPIL: [desolated] No, Professor.
For full extended scene, please refer to the script edition cited here: Ionesco, Eugene, The Lesson, Samuel French, 1958, pp. 51-59.
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