A mathematician wants to upend French politics. Can he win Paris?
It’s a cold, early February evening in Paris, and the Trianon theatre is jam-packed. About a thousand men and women of all ages have raucously filled the orchestra pit and balconies, not intimidated by the red velvets and sumptuous Belle Epoque decor. Most of them look like upper middle class, the kind of people you would run into in a downtown bookstore, or, well, at the theatre. They seem excited: many of them are wielding colourful banners and singing chants as they wait for their man to show up. There is less than a month and a half to