No Title
Swaha Sahoo
ARCHIMEDES AND THE SLICE OF BREAD Hans Sande. Translated by Marietta Taralrud Maddrel. Illustrated by Gry Moursund Eklavya, 2021, 36 pp., 399.00
November 2021, volume 45, No 11

Archimedes and the Slice of Bread—the title piques your interest and you dive right in. The book is about a father who is trying hard to invent something, and his daughter Eureka and her cat Archimedes. Eureka feels sorry for Papa, who has never invented anything in his life, except for trying to invent a square soap bubble that burst before he was successful. The only thing he has invented is a strange name for her.
Archimedes loved to lick butter off Eureka’s slice of bread. Once when Archimedes tries to lick the caviar off Papa’s slice of bread, he lifts him and throws him away from the table. The cat lands on all fours and the slice lands with the buttered side down. The cat always lands on its feet. A slice of bread always lands with the buttered side down, Papa tells Eureka. It’s the law of nature.
Eureka is puzzled and tries hard to make sense of the two laws of nature that Papa has discovered. She squints hard at Papa, lying in his bathtub. ‘Don’t squint Eureka,’ shouts Papa. ‘The wind might change and then you will stay like that.’All day long Papa’s laws of nature whirl around in Eureka’s mind. She has to test it to believe it! So Eureka cuts a thick slice of bread, butters it and ties it to Archimedes’ back. Then she takes her cat and drops him into thin air right out of the open window.

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