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Literary Challenge

Mathematics in Literature
 

Can you identify the author of the following passage? The book? Write us at hubbard@matrixeditions.com with "math metaphors" as the subject. Or submit your favorite literary passage involving mathematics. 

We will give the answer and post a new excerpt August 1.

New Challenge

...for a long time you were kept in the shadows, and people did their best not to think about you.  And if they did, they tried to convince themselves you weren't really like us.  That you were less than human, so it didn't matter.  And that was how things stood until our little movement came along.  But do you see what we were up against?  We were virtually attempting to square the circle.  Here was the world, requiring students to donate.  While that remained the case, there would always be a barrier against seeing you as properly human
 

Previous challenge

He knew, without turning to look, that Professor Tonks had entered the room.  It was always like this with Tonks, the quiet entry.  He seemed  to insinuate himself into the room.  You knew he'd arrived only when you saw the students sitting opposite straighten their shoulders or bend more anxiously over their drawings.  Tonks was a dark planet whose presence could be deduced only by a deviation in the orbit of other bodies.

Answer

This is from Life Class by Pat Barker, winner of the Booker Prize for The Ghost Road


For earlier challenges (and their answers), go to previous challenges

 

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