At school, I was taught by a married couple of maths teachers called Mr and Mrs Deas. Little imagination was called for from Mrs Deas. She taught what the Scottish curriculum of the day called 'arithmetic'. Most of it was easy. I remember one lesson called 'How to Write a Cheque'. There was no corresponding lesson on 'How to Cash a Cheque'. Mrs Deas didn't need to explain the usefulness of knowing how to count. Yet even with arithmetic, I've since lost my grasp of the fancier functions, like compound interest, which would have been so valuable now in working out just how much I'm being screwed by my mortgage lender.

LRB 11 July 2002 | PDF Download