Quotes from book
The Housekeeper and the Professor

Name: The Housekeeper and the Professor
Author: Yōko Ogawa

Yōko OgawaOriginal title 博士の愛した数式 (Japanese, 2003)

The Housekeeper and the Professor is a novel by Yōko Ogawa set in modern-day Japan. It was published in August 2003, by Shinchosha and was the first recipient of the Hon'ya Taisho award .The story centers around a mathematician, "the Professor," who suffered brain damage in a traffic accident in 1975 and since then can produce only 80 minutes' worth of memories, and his interactions with a housekeeper and her son "Root" as the Professor shares the beauty of equations with them.

“He treated Root exactly as he treated prime numbers. For him, primes were the base on which all other natural numbers relied; and children were the foundation of everything worthwhile in the adult world”

Yōko Ogawa book The Housekeeper and the Professor

Source: The Housekeeper and the Professor

“A problem isn't finished just because you've found the right answer.”

Yōko Ogawa book The Housekeeper and the Professor

Source: The Housekeeper and the Professor

“Soon after I began working for the Professor, I realized that he talked about numbers whenever he was unsure of what to say or do. Numbers were also his way of reaching out to the world. They were safe, a source of comfort.”

Yōko Ogawa book The Housekeeper and the Professor

Source: The Housekeeper and the Professor