[...] I cut a poor figure in society. My friends, including Zaza, played their worldly roles with ease; they put in an appearance on their mothers’ at-home days, served tea, smiled and smiled, and talked amiably about nothing; I found smiling difficult, I couldn’t turn on the charm, make cute remarks, or any kind of concession to polite chit-chat. My parents would hold up to me as examples ‘remarkably intelligent’ girls who nevertheless were brilliant ornaments to their mothers’ drawing-rooms. This used to exasperate me because I knew that their way of life had nothing in common with mine: they were mere amateurs; I was a professional. That year I was preparing for examinations in literature, Latin, and general mathematics, and I was learning Greek; I had set this heavy programme myself, for I found difficulties amusing: but precisely in order that I might be able to embark light-heartedly on such an undertaking, it was essential that my studies should not just represent an off-shoot of my life, but should be my entire life itself: the things people talked about did not interest me, I had no subversive ideas; in fact, I hardly had any ideas on anything; but all day long I would be training myself to think, to understand, to criticize, to know myself; I was seeking for the absolute truth: this preoccupation did not exactly encourage polite conversation.