By my calculation, there are 1,035 possible pairs of even numbers between 10 and 100 inclusive, so this might take rather longer than she claims. The Housekeeper and the Professoris a fairly charming, fairly simple story that is very nicely told. The mix of mathematics and domestic life is appealing and well done, and in describing a household of such mutual support Ogawa paints a touching picture. Summary. The Professor used to be a math professor Memory stops in … She gives him a bath. The housekeeper takes the Professor to get his hair cut, after which she remarks, perfectly: "For once he smelled of shaving cream rather than of paper." Summary Chapter 15. Subsequently, nothing much happens. Women and Sisterhood. He is a brilliant math Professor with a peculiar problem—ever since a traumatic head injury, he … About This Book In The Housekeeper and the Professor, Yoko Ogawa tells an intimate story about family, the nature of memory, and the poetry of mathematics.It is also, in a sense, a story about the simple experience of getting to know someone, but with a twist: the person forgets everything in eighty minutes. We learn about primes, triangular numbers, the invention of zero, and so on, in surprisingly warm-hearted scenes of exposition. Once he has drawn a picture of her and clipped it to his suit so that he is not altogether surprised to see her every day, he begins to induct her into number theory. Summary. The Professor wins a contest in a mathematics magazine and waves away congratulations, saying he just "peeked in God's notebook". The Housekeeper and the Professor is an enchanting story about what it means to live in the present, and about the curious equations that can create a family. The Help Introduction + Context. Chapter 2. He is a brilliant math Professor with a peculiar problem—ever since a traumatic head injury, he has lived with only eighty minutes of short-term memory. Chapter 8 The Governess and Mrs. Grose attempt to keep their heads on straight and not get carried away with extravagant ideas – but it's tough to stay calm when you're dealing with evil spirits. At first, the prime numbers are frequent, but "When you get to much bigger numbers - a million or 10 million - you're venturing into a wasteland where the primes are terribly far apart [...] that's right, a desert. Yoko Ogawa's The Housekeeper and the Professor is an enchanting story about what it means to live in the present, and about the curious equations that can create a family. The Professor is so compassionate towards Root. In Chapter 3, we can take many things out of what has happened so far. Chapter 8. Transience … Chapter 4 The Professor is very close to Root and the Housekeeper. “The Housekeeper and the Professor” is a contemporary novel by Yoko Ogawa in which the young single mother, the Housekeeper, comes to care for the elderly and amnesiac Professor with her son, Root, learning much about life and mathematics in the process. Chapter 8: "Duel Between the Professor and the Poet" Just as Styopa loses consciousness in Yalta, Homeless awakens in the hospital. The housekeeper, who had been already well instructed in what she was to answer, said, "What room or what nothing is it that your worship is looking for? ... Summary Chapter 8. Women and Sisterhood. Summary Chapter 12. This Study Guide consists of approximately 36 pages of chapter summaries, quotes, character analysis, themes, and more - "It's as if he has a single, 80-minute videotape inside his head," the narrator explains, "and when he records anything new, he has to record over the existing memories. I just need the most important things. A fine little entertainment. He is reminded of his plight when the nurse attending him mentions foreign tourists, but decides not to tell her about Pontius Pilate. The protagonist, Claire, is a 24-year-old, very unlikeable and struggling young adult. The book is narrated by the housekeeper of the title, a single mother employed by an agency, who is assigned a new client. Summary Chapter 11. It is about a sixty-four-year-old mathematician. And yet this novel, with its skilful admixture of tender atmospherics and stealthy education, has sold more than 4 million copies in its native Japan. Fri 1 May 2009 19.01 EDT First published on Fri 1 May 2009 19.01 EDT. 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