Survivre et Vivre - Grothendieck Project -
Ecological movement forerunner
"L'espace d'un homme" Film by Hervé Nisic.

« I knew Grothendieck, at least I saw Grothendieck it was in 1966, I was researcher at the CNRS and my boss was Daniel Kastler who had been invited that year to IHES for one year.

As it was my thesis supervisor, I would regularly visit him at IHES and discuss with him my work.

And what impressed me was that we only saw Grothendieck at the canteen, we were the Physicists-Theoricians, we were apart (it was a "sub-race") ... [laughs] ... and on the other side there were Mathematicians who were very appreciated.

And so we saw Grothendieck only at the canteen, he was surrounded by a cloud of Mathematicians, they had a big table for them. He was sitting at the head of the table and he was talking all the time, and all the others were listening religiously.

It sure impressed us very very much.

Then when I learned that he had resigned from IHES because IHES was partly funded by NATO, it impressed me even more, and it gave a humanistic aspect, a moral aspect that I did not know him.

I actually met him personally, it was at the time he was appointed Professor in Montpellier, and we Marseille teachers, we went to Montpellier to see their teaching experiences, and there I heard about the courses he was doing on the playground when the weather was nice.

And when I left, I went straight to his house, he greeted me very kindly, and even offered to drink tea with him, he was sitting on the floor, it was extremely simple but extremely pleasant, and something was coming from him that touched me a lot.

Thank you very much for this film, which is absolutely extraordinary, which makes it possible to feel again, what I felt at the time when I had seen him and talked to him.

It is very impressive, it is the second time that I watch it, and every time I am very moved, Thank you. »