The Know-It-All (2005) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

Summary edit see section history

Characters/People edit see section history

• A.J. Jacobs: The author and reader of the aforementioned encyclopedia.
• Julie: The narrator's wife.
• Eric: The know-it-all brother-in-law of the author.

Quotes edit see section history

• “The Britannica is still the gold standard, the Tiffany’s of encyclopedias. Founded in 1768, it’s the longest continually published reference book in history. Over the years, the Britannica’s contributors have included Einstein, Freud and Harry Houdini. Its current roster includes dozens of academics with Nobels, Pulitzers and other types of awards with ceremonies that don’t feature commentary from Melissa Rivers. The Britannica passed through some tough times during the dot-com craze, and it long ago phased out the door-to-door salesman, but it keeps chugging along. The legendary Eleventh edition from 1911 is thought by many to be the best-it’s inspired a fervid if mild-mannered cult –but the current editions are still the greatest single source of knowledge.”

• “The eleventh was the culmination of the Enlightenment, the last great work of the Age of Reason, the final instance when all human knowledge could be presented with a single point of view. Four years late, the confidence and optimism that had produced the eleventh would be, as Konig puts it, “a casualty in the slaughter at Ypres and Argonne.”

• “Yes, there’s the Internet. I could try to read Google from A to Z. But the Internet’s about as reliable as publications sold next to Trident and Duracell at the supermarket checkout line. Want a quick check on the trustworthiness of the Internet? Do a search on the words ‘perffectionist’ and ‘perfestionist.’ No, I prefer my old-school books. There’s something appealingly stable about the Britannica. I don’t even want that new-fangled CD-ROM for $49 or the monthly Britannica online service. I’ll take the leatherette volumes for $1400–which is not cheap, but it’s certainly less expensive than grad school. And anyway, at the end of this, maybe I can go on Jeopardy! and win enough to buy a dozen sets.”

• “Of all domestic animals, the character of the cat is the most equivocal and suspicious. He is kept, not for any amiable qualities, but purely with a view to banish rats, mice and other noxious animals from our houses… constantly bent on theft and rapine, they are full of cunning and dissimulation; they conceal their designs; seize every opportunity of doing mischief, and then fly from punishment… In a word, the cat is totally destitute of friendship.”

• “We have made our lives better. A thousand times better. Never again will I mythologize the past as some sort of golden age. Remember: in the 19th Century, the mortality rate was 75 percent fro a caesarean section… the workday was fourteen hours.. the life expectancy in ancient Rome was twenty nine years. Widows had to marry their late husband’s brother. Originally forks only had one tine, and umbrellas were available only in black, and you ate four-day old fetid meat for dinner.”

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• But we were born of risen apes, not fallen angels, and the apes were armed killers besides. And so what shall we wonder at? Our murders and massacres and missiles, and our irreconcilable regiments? Or our treaties whatever they may be worth; our symphonies however seldom they may be played; our peaceful acres, however frequently they may be converted into battlefields; our dreams however rarely they may be accomplished. The miracle of man is not how far he has sunk but how magnificently he has risen. We are known among the stars by our poems, not our corpses.

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• “I’m curious about everything — even things that don’t interest me.”

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• Mann, Horace In his final speech, the educational reformer told students: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”

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• “When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal and exhausting condition until death do them part.”

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• evil, no less than good, derives from the small moral choices human beings make moment by moment.”

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• As George Bernard Shaw said, “All great truths start as blasphemies.”

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• As my friend the financial analyst once told me about his line of work: sometimes right, sometimes wrong, always certain.

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• Horace Mann quote: “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”

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• Berserkers Savage Norse soldiers from the middle ages who, it is said, went into battle naked. Hence “going berserk.” So to truly go berserk, you should take off your pants. Noted.

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• In 1920, after marrying Zelda and publishing This Side of Paradise, Fitzgerald wrote: “Riding in a taxi one afternoon between very tall buildings under a mauve and rosy sky, I began to bawl because I had everything I wanted and knew I would never be so happy again.”

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• New York

First Sentence edit see section history

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

• Father-Son Relationships: Jacobs' father originally intended to read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica, and only made it to the mid-B's. By finishing his father's quest, Jacobs seeks to understand the man he resembles so much.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. A. J. Jacobs (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: AE 5.E44 J33 2004
• Dewey: 031

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Biographies & Memoirs › Professionals & Academics › Journalists
• Books › Reference › Encyclopedias › History
• Books › Literature & Fiction › Books & Reading › History of Books
• Books › Biographies & Memoirs › Memoirs

Books That Influenced This Book edit see section history

Books Cited by This Book edit see section history