The speaker, on the topic of suspicion the truth of Chevalier's memoir, challenges the validity of the author, providing the opposite evidence concerning Chevalier's wealth, accuracy of conversation and the experience of prison breaking.
Firstly, the professor points out that it can not be doubted that Chevalier is rich enough. As opposed to the passage about that he usually borrowed large amount of money, the professor claims that he needed time to sell things to gain cashes to pay for the bills for he was fascinated by parties and gambling. So that is why he must borrow money before he get cashes. From this case, the lecture has effectively railed against the passage.
Secondly, those records between Chevalier and Voltaire’s conversation must be true. Despite of the assumption from the passage that the conversation was written many years after the talk, the speaker thinks that Chevalier had a habit to document what is talked after every conversation immediately, so he would not cheat in his memoir. This is another part which the speaker questions the passage.
Thirdly, Chevalier did break the prison through ceilings. According to the speaker, there existed other prisoners who are more powerful than Chevalier, but no one except Chevalier escaped from prison by bribing the jailers at that time. Furthermore, after Chevalier escaping, his prison room’s ceiling was repaired, which makes the memoir tenable. Such information has effectively refutes the passage. 作者: speedzshaw 时间: 2010-2-25 00:19:33