by A. J. Jacobs
Again, the Britannica to the rescue. I know my planets. I remember the poor telescope operator Challis whose claim to fame is that he failed to discover Neptune. Neptune's the tough one to find. Neptune it is.
I zip through the rest. And here's the weird part: the questions that leave me baffled mostly focus on my former safe haven, pop culture. What country is Latina pop star Shakira from? Not a clue. If I were keeping up with my People magazines instead of burying my nose in the Britannica, I would know.
This is big. I've officially made the switch in where my gaps lie. As I've started to fill in holes in history and science and literature, new holes have opened up in pop culture. I make a guess about Shakira's native land (it's Colombia) and am finished a good four minutes before they tell us, "Pencils down!"
"So how'd you do?" I ask my unemployed BlackBerry owner.
"Pretty well," she says. "I didn't know the one about Captain Matthew Perry."
"Commodore Matthew Perry," I correct her.
"Yes, Commodore Perry. I didn't know which country he opened up to trade."
"That'd be Japan," I say, suppressing the urge to pat her on the head. "Did you think it was the Republic of Courtney Cox?" I chuckle.
She doesn't react.
"Because, you know, the actor on Friends is named Matthew Perry as well," I say. "And he's going out with Courtney Cox on the show."
God, I can be a condescending schmuck. Meanwhile, the other end of our table has become very noisy. A fierce debate has erupted over the question "Which advertising character is known for lying?" The correct answer is fast-talking eighties car salesman Joe Isuzu, but one man is arguing that Madge--the Palmolive lady--was also a stinking liar. Madge refused to admit that her soft hands were the result of submersion in Palmolive. A lie.
But the argument will have to wait. The tests have been graded by Millionaire's speedy computer. We were each assigned a number--mine is two--and the emcee begins calling out the winners.
"Number three!"
The crowd claps grudgingly for number three, who stands up and takes a deep waist bow.
"Number eighty-six!"
More halfhearted applause.
As he reads off number after number, I start to doubt myself. Maybe Shakira screwed me. "Number fourteen!" Maybe after months of stuffing my head, I'm still so ignorant I can't get an audience with Meredith Vieira. "Number two."
Thank God! "Yes!" I shout, as I jump up and do a Rocky fist pump. I'm as happy as Lindbergh landing at Paris (his prize: $25,000).
There are about fifteen of us winners--my BlackBerry friend among us--and we are instructed to migrate to the back of the room. Our crucible isn't over. We still have to clear another hurdle: the interview. We are smart enough, but are we interesting and presentable enough? Do we have enough personality and basic hygiene? Are we semiattractive?
I am just as nervous about passing the telegenic test as I was about the knowledge quiz. It reminds me of a particularly humiliating episode in my career. This was about ten years ago, back when I was in my mid-twenties and trying to sell my first book--an analysis of the eerie similarities between Jesus and Elvis. One of the publishing companies said they loved the book, but they had just one request: could they see a photograph of me?
"Why do they want a photograph?" I asked my agent. "Is this normal?"
"They just want to make sure you're presentable, so you can go on talk shows. Just to make sure you don't have three heads."
So I went to a photographer at a department store near San Francisco, where I was living at the time. The photographer put me in front of some oscillating fans so as to tussle my hair just right, gave me some flattering upward lighting, and snapped a few dozen pictures. I sent them in.
A week later, my agent calls. "I'm sorry, they've decided to pass."
As you can imagine, this was not the best news for my ego. Apparently, I wasn't good-looking enough to be an author. An author. I wasn't asking to be a soap opera actor or a news anchor or a Gucci model. I just wanted to sit in my room alone and write books. But apparently I wasn't even attractive enough to do that. Did Nathaniel Hawthorne have the ladies' hearts aflutter? Did Herman Melville have killer abs? Maybe so.
In any case, I'm hoping that the Millionaire folks are a little more liberal. The interviews are one-on-one affairs, and mine is with a young brunette named Wendy.
"So how would your friends describe you?" she asks.
I hate that question. What am I supposed to say? That they think I'm wildly entertaining and shockingly intelligent? "I guess they'd describe me as lanky."
She seems confused. "That's all they'd say?"
"Maybe lanky and brown-haired."
She knits her brows. Uh-oh. This is not going well. I learn my lesson, and answer the rest of her questions in as orthodox a manner as possible. My delivery, however, is not ideal. I spend the remainder of the interview mumbling and shifting my eyes. Instead of the effervescent game show contestant that I should be, I come off as if I've just been arrested for shoplifting marital aids.
Wendy takes out the Polaroid.
"Okay, say 'cheese'!"
I thought it'd be funny to say "Emmentaler cheese, which is what the Swiss call Swiss cheese, which gets its holes from the carbon dioxide that is formed while it ferments at seventy-five degrees." But I don't. I just say "cheese." Which is probably a good thing.
pet
It's believed that the ancient Egyptians used geese as guard animals.
Petrarch
I'm completely ignorant of this man, but he sounds like someone I should know about. Here's what I learn: He's a 14th-century Italian poet famous for his chaste love of a woman named Laura. He first spotted Laura on April 6, 1327, at the Church of Saint Clare at Avignon, when he was 22 years old. He loved her, says the Britannica, almost until his death, even though she was out of his reach. And from this love sprang the poems that made Petrarch's name.
Oh boy. Another one of these guys. There are at least a dozen such fellows sprinkled through the encyclopedia. Like Dante, who dedicated most of his poetry to a woman named Beatrice, whom he loved and worshiped since he saw her at age nine, even though he never got so much as a single peck on the cheek. Or Byron, obsessed for decades with his cousin, who had spurned him as a young man.
What's the word we have today for men like this? Oh yes. "Stalker." If they were around now, Beatrice and Laura would slap restraining orders on their respective obsessors. Perhaps something like "Mr. Petrarch is forbidden to come within one hundred yards of Laura. In addition, he is forbidden to write sonnets, octets, epics, couplets, limericks, or haiku that name or allude to Laura in any way, most especially ones that compare her to a summer day."
And what about the husbands? Yes, these yearned-for women were, in many cases, married, but you never get these schmos' side of the story. Beatrice, the daughter of a noble Florentine family, got married to a man named Simone. If he didn't, Simone needed to have a little conversation with Dante:
"I can't help but notice that you keep writing love poetry to my wife. Well, you see, I married her, which makes her my wife. You know what you might want to try? Writing some poems about the sunset. The sunset isn't fucking married."
I know I shouldn't be thinking these thoughts. I know they make me sound like a philistine. I know I'm looking at the long and marvelous history of romantic love through my shallow 21st-century lenses. I'm supposed to be smartening up. Shouldn't I marvel at the depth of their emotion? Shouldn't I be inspired to read their love poems?
Instead, I just want to tell them to shut their cake holes and get over it. I want to tell them to go on Dr. Phil and get their head chewed off. I want to tell them what I tell my friend John, who is still hung up on his college crush, a woman who later went on to star in an Adam Sandler movie. "John, you can't have her. It's over. Sign on to match.com and find yourself a new woman. Okay?"
Of course, Petrarch and Dante probably didn't have match.com available. They'd have
to settle for something more primitive, like video dating services. But you get the idea.
philosophy
I studied philosophy for four years. But I'd trade everything I learned for this passage, originally written by a scholar named Robert Ardrey and quoted in the Britannica:
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.
Amen. That's great stuff. If ever I was going to faint like the woman who read Montaigne's essays, this would be the time, because that is a powerful set of sentences. That has been the major and ongoing battle as I read the Britannica and live my life--the battle to find the bright side, which is something I'm not constitutionally inclined to do. Never has the case been stated better. Of course, I don't like poems. But I'm happy to substitute that we are known among the stars by our movies, books, a great joke, a comfortable pair of shoes, a beautiful and towering building--and not by our corpses.
Phryne
I now know far too much about odd legal proceedings. I know about the 9th-century trial of Pope Formosus. He didn't do so well under cross-examination, seeing as he was--I believe this is the technical term--dead. His successor--Pope Stephen VI--hated Formosus's policies so much, he had Formosus's corpse exhumed, propped up on a throne, and put on trial. Shockingly, Formosus lost. As punishment, his fingers were cut off and his corpse was thrown into the Tiber River.
I also know about the Burmese practice known as "Ordeal by divination," in which two parties are given candles of equal size that are lighted simultaneously; the owner of the candle that lasts longer wins the case. And I know about the medieval practice of "appeal to the corpse," which allowed the dead body to point out the murderer.
So I know some things. But nothing could prepare me for the trial of Phryne. Phryne was a famous prostitute in ancient Greece. Her name means Toad--a sobriquet she picked up because of her sallow complexion. Phryne was phenomenally successful at her job; she made so much money she offered to rebuild the walls of Thebes. But she was also controversial, as prostitutes tend to be.
Phryne was on trial for blasphemy, a capital offense. Things were looking a bit bleak for Phryne, so she employed an interesting defense. In the words of the Britannica, Phryne tore her dress and "displayed her bosom, which so moved the jury that they acquitted her." That's what the EB says. She flashed her tits and she got released. I believe in legal circles this is called the "Greek Whore Gone Wild defense."
Now, I don't need the EB to teach me that your average heterosexual man loves looking at boobs. I've worked at a couple of magazines that based their economic model on this fact. I've received an e-mail from my previous boss expressing outrage that Jodie Foster's nipple had been digitally erased from a photo. So I know.
Still, this is surprising historical evidence. Men really will do anything after looking at a lady's top shelf. A pair of breasts are mesmerizing enough to be a powerful weapon. No doubt, Phryne's were particularly impressive--they were green, for one thing. And earlier in the Britannica, I read that jury duty lasted an entire year in ancient Greece. So the guys were probably desperate for a little variety.
But I wonder if lawyers today could make this work. It could revolutionize the profession. "Yes, my client poisoned her husband and chopped him into chunks the size of croutons and fed him to her Rottweiler. We admit that. But gentlemen of the jury: have you seen her rack?"
pigeon
I know I just talked about passenger pigeons. But I've reached the entry on the nonpassenger kind, the regular old pigeons who are, right now, as always, strutting on the windowsill of my office.
After reading about them, I lay my volume on the glass table and spend a good five minutes observing the three-dimensional version. Their characteristic head bobbing when they walk from one end of the ledge to the other. The skin saddle between the bill and the forehead. Their little orange eyes. The way they dive their bill into their feathers to preen, which I have learned spreads skin oil to the feathers.
They're remarkable. They may be flying rats, as my mom calls them, but they're remarkable flying rats. Plus, they're monogamous for life--the surviving spouse accepts a new mate only slowly--which makes me empathize with them all the more.
As I stare dumbfounded at the three pigeons head-bobbing their way along the ledge, I have that "whoa" feeling, as if I've just done some bong hits, like that freshman in Animal House who said, "You mean, our whole solar system could be one tiny atom in the fingernail of some giant being?" Three hours of heavy reading will do that to me, send my mind into a different state. I find myself being blown away by pigeons.
Earlier, I was concerned that all this reading was bad for my relationship with the world. I wondered if I wasn't like John Locke's blind man, who learned all about the concept of scarlet but remained totally clueless as to its true nature. Maybe. But I've decided it can have the opposite effect too. It can enhance my relationship with the world, make me marvel at it, see it with new eyes.
And those eyes are constantly shifting. When I read about the hydrosphere, I see the world as a vehicle for water--the rain, the evaporation, the rivers, the clouds. Then I'll read about energy conversion, and see the world as a collection of ever-shifting quanta of energy. There are infinite numbers of ways to slice the universe, and I keep seeing cut after cut. Recently, I tried to trace the role of pumpkins through history (the highlight being the Pumpkin Papers, which were documents from alleged spy Alger Hiss that were hidden in pumpkins). Pumpkins might be slicing it too thin. Perhaps gourds would be better.
Pirandello, Luigi
The Italian playwright, creator of Six Characters in Search of an Author. Pirandello said in 1920: "I think that life is a very sad piece of buffoonery; because we have in ourselves, without being able to know why, wherefore or whence, the need to deceive ourselves constantly by creating a reality (one for each and never the same for all), which from time to time is discovered to be vain and illusory.... My art is full of bitter compassion for all those who deceive themselves; but this compassion cannot fail to be followed by the ferocious derision of destiny which condemns man to deception." Good Lord. That's a bleak paragraph. That is just the kind of thinking I'm a sucker for--that life is just a sad piece of buffoonery. But it's not healthy. I've got to fight it, wash it out of my mind with thoughts like Robert Ardrey's on the miracle of man. Is Ardrey's point of view just pitiable self-deception? I hope not.
planetary features
Julie comes into my reading room.
"Honey," she says, "look at this. What do you think is going on?"
She lifts her shirt to reveal a rash that has taken over a good part of her stomach.
"Looks like the Great Red Spot on the surface of Jupiter."
"What?"
"The Great Red Spot. It's this strange big red cloud on Jupiter, like fifteen thousand miles long. Scientists don't know what causes it, but they think it's a storm or maybe a--"
Julie pulls her shirt down and walks out. Not another word. Just walks out of the room and shuts the door a little too hard. Uh-oh. Not good. When she's peeved, Julie argues with you, gives you sass, lets you know exactly what's annoying her.
But when she's furious, she clams up and walks right out of the room. When she's furious, she goes scarily silent and retreats to another place until she calms down.
This is a furious.
I probably should have known this is not the best time for a fun fact. I already pushed Julie to the breaking point this morning. She suggested that maybe we have a picnic in the Central Park--it was such a nice da
y. I told her no thanks. I could see the park from the window in the reading room.
So that didn't go well. And now this.
I try to go back to reading. I start in on Plateau Indian and platform tennis, but it's not working; I'm too distracted.
Julie doesn't even have to argue with me. I'm arguing with myself, and I'm losing: She doesn't need this now, not with our fertility woes already blackening moods. She doesn't need to hear about an astronomical phenomenon. She needs to hear: "Oh, no. I'm sorry to see that you have a rash. Does it itch? Can I help? Have you eaten anything unusual?" When these facts in my brain push out my ability to empathize, then maybe I've got to reassess. When I'm too busy parading around my knowledge to ask about the health of my wife, that's bad news.
A couple of days ago I was congratulating myself on my appreciation for pigeons. But now I feel like doing some penance. I feel as though I should flagellate myself like a 14th-century Christian (before the practice was condemned by Pope Clement VI). Instead, I go to the bathroom and fetch a tube of Lanacane anti-itch cream.
I crack the door of the bedroom, where Julie has retreated. Her fury has melted to sadness. I hold out my peace offering, a yellow tube of ointment.
"Sorry."
"I really need you to be here for me."
"I know."
Plath, Sylvia
What is it with writers and suicide? I knew about Plath before I read the Ps--and I knew about Hemingway before I read the Hs. But man, what an army of company they have. Writers are drawn to self-destruction like hawk moths to the Madagascar orchid (the insect has a remarkable nine-inch nose that it uses on the orchid's long nectar receptacle). I tried to start a body count every time I read another self-destructive writer, but it got so high I'd need scientific notation.
A French writer I'd never heard of hanged himself from a lamppost. A Peruvian did it in a deserted classroom. A Japanese poet finished himself off with his mistress at a mountain retreat. They throw themselves down stairwells, they leap from bridges. One Hungarian writer weighted his clothes down with stones and jumped in a lake, foreshadowing Virginia Woolf, who will do the same in another few thousand pages.
