Lobachevsky

Lobachevsky - Tom Lehrer

Lyrics by：Tom Lehrer

Composed by：Tom Lehrer

For many years now mr danny kaye

Who has been my particular idol since childbirth

Has been doing a routine about the great russian director

Stanislavsky and the secret of success in the actiofession

And i thought it would be interesting to stea

To adapt this idea to the field of mathematics

To there to make explicit

I always like to make explicit the fact that before

I went off not too long ago to figh

The trenches i was a mathematician by profession

I don't like people to get the idea that

I have to do this for a living

I mean it isn't as though i had to do this you know

I could be making

Oh 3000 dollars a year just teaching

Be that as it may

Some of you may have had occasion to

Run into mathematicians and to wonder therefore how they got that way

And here

In partial explanation perhaps

Is the story of the great

Ian mathematician nicolai ivanovich lobachevsky

Who made me the genius i am today

The mathematician that others all quote

Who's the professor that made me that way

The greatest that ever got chalk on his coat

One man deserves the credit

One man deserves the blame

And nicolai ivanovich lobachevsky is his name

Hi

Nicolai ivanovich lobach

I am never forget the day i first meet the great lobachevsky

In one word he told me secret of success in mathematics

Plagiarize

Plagiarize

Let no one else's work evade your eyes

Remember why the good lord made your eyes

So don't shade your eyes

But plagiarize plagiarize plagiarize

Only be sure always to call it please 'research'

And ever since i meet this man

My life is not the same

And nicolai ivanovich lobachevsky is his name

Hi

Nicolai ivanovich lobach

I am never forget the day i am given first original paper

To write it was on analytic and algebraic topology of

Locally euclidean parameterization of infinitely differentiable

Riemannian manifold

Bozhe moi

This i know from nothing

But i think of great lobachevsky and get idea ahah

I have a friend in minsk

Who has a friend in pinsk

Whose friend in omsk

Has friend in tomsk

With friend in akmolinsk

His friend in alexandrovsk

Has friend in petropavlovsk

Whose friend somehow

Is solving now

The problem in dnepropetrovsk

And when his work is done

Ha ha begins the fun

From dnepropetrovsk

To petropavlovsk

By way of iliysk

And novorossiysk

To alexandrovsk to akmolinsk

To tomsk to omsk

To pinsk to minsk

To me the news will run

Yes to me the news will run

And then i write

By morning night

And afternoon

And pretty soon

My name in dnepropetrovsk is cursed

When he finds out i publish first

And who made me a big success

And brought me wealth and fame

Nicolai ivanovich lobachevsky is his name

Hi

Nicolai ivanovich lobach

I am never forget the day my first book is published

Every chapter i stole from somewhere else

Index i copy from old vladivostok telephone directory

This book

This book was sensational

Pravda well pravda pravda said russian double-talk

It stinks

But izvestia izvestia said russian double-talk

It stinks

Metro goldwyn moskva buys movie rights for six million rubles

Changing title to 'the eternal triangle'

With brigitte bardot playing part of hypotenuse

And who deserves the credit

And who deserves the blame

Nicolai ivanovich lobachevsky is his name

Hi