Part memoir and part education (or lack thereof), The Know-It-All
chronicles NPR contributor A.J. Jacobs's hilarious, enlightening, and
seemingly impossible quest to read the Encyclopaedia Britannica from A
to Z.
33,000 PAGES
44 MILLION WORDS
10 BILLION YEARS OF HISTORY
1 OBSESSED MAN
To fill the ever-widening gaps in his Ivy League education, A.J. Jacobs
sets for himself the daunting task of reading all thirty-two volumes of
the Encyclopaedia Britannica. His wife, Julie, tells him it's a waste
of time, his friends believe he is losing his mind, and his father, a
brilliant attorney who had once attempted the same feat and quit
somewhere around Borneo, is encouraging but unconvinced.
With self-deprecating wit and a disarming frankness, The Know-It-All
recounts the unexpected and comically disruptive effects Operation
Encyclopedia has on every part of Jacobs's life -- from his newly minted
marriage to his complicated relationship with his father and the rest of
his charmingly eccentric New York family to his day job as an editor at
Esquire. Jacobs's project tests the outer limits of his stamina and
forces him to explore the real meaning of intelligence as he endeavors
to join Mensa, win a spot on Jeopardy!, and absorb 33,000 pages of
learning. On his journey he stumbles upon some of the strangest,
funniest, and most profound facts about every topic under the sun, all
while battling fatigue, ridicule, and the paralyzing fear that attends
his first real-life responsibility -- the impending birth of his first
child.
The Know-It-All is an ingenious, mightily entertaining memoir of one
man's intellect, neuroses, and obsessions, and a struggle between the
all-consuming quest for factual knowledge and the undeniable gift of
hard-won wisdom.
