Article published on the L’Asino on July 4th 1925
-Today I’ll examine you. Let’s see what you’ve learned, and if you pay justice to the sacrifices made by your father in order to have you go to school. Let’s start with Arithmetic. What’s the first operation?
-The kick-off
-No; I was talking about Arithmetic. I can tell you are thinking about foot-ball. The first operation is addition. Let’s go on. Numbers are divided in fractions; how are these fractions called?
-Full-backs, jugs…
-Once again, foot-ball! Lets try with Geometry. What is the plane surface, comprised in a perimeter, called?
-Field
-No; area!
-Ah, yes! Penalty kick and goal area.
-What is that instrument shaped like a right triangle called?
-Team
-Team what?! It’s called set square. And what is that solid object whose surface has all of its points equally distant from an inner point called centre?
-Ball.
-No, my dear sir, it’s called sphere. Let’s move on to natural science. What is that metal, that is the first constituent of lime, called?
-I don’t know.
-Calcium. (in Italian “calcio” which means foot-ball, TN)
-Pardon me professor, it’s not called “calcio”: it’s called foot-ball.
-And that member of the human body that ends with the arm, and that is used to touch objects?
-Skoot.
-What does that mean?
-Hand, which mustn’t touch anything, otherwise it is a great fool: “fallo.”
-In business mathematics, do you know what the batch to give and take is?
-The batch is a match.
-Haven’t you ever heard of Ghiberti, the artist that created the bronze doors of San Giovanni in Florence?
-I don’t know the name of this door goal-keeper. And I usually know all of the goalkeepers.
-Haven’t you ever heard of the Black and Whites, the two Medieval factions?
-No; I only know the Blues. (colour of the Italian national foot-ball team, TN)
-And do you know Italian?
-A bit.
-Let’s hear. Read a passage.
-“The aim of each team is to mark the goal door: make the goal…”
-Enough, enough, please, I recommend you take the door, make the goal… of a mental institution.
Scalarini