The size of thoughts : essays and other lumber

267 Pages·1997·1.53 MB·English

by  Baker

Acclaim for NICHOLSON BAKER’S
The Size of Thoughts
“A trove of treasures large and small—opulent … ingenious.”
—San Francisco Chronicle
“There are extravagant delights here.… It’s as if S. J. Perelman had been
put in charge of the whole Humanities syllabus.”
—The New York Review of Books
“Whole bushel baskets of perceptions, engaging and quirky, each and all.
… A fine, surprising, pungent, playful and thought-provoking bouquet of
a book.”
—Los Angeles Times Book Review
“Baker is an utterly idiosyncratic, artistically adventurous, passionately
intellectual writer.… He notices things that no one else notices, and he
articulates what he notices extraordinarily well. He writes heart-stopping
sentences and he’s hilarious—what more are we supposed to ask for?”
—Village Voice
“Always funny.… Baker’s talent can turn not only dross but actual
deadwood into gold.”
—Newsday
Books by
NICHOLSON BAKER
The Mezzanine
Room Temperature
U and I
Vox
The Fermata
The Size of Thoughts
NICHOLSON BAKER
The Size of Thoughts
Nicholson Baker was born in 1957 and attended the Eastman School of
Music and Haverford College. He is the author of four novels—The
Mezzanine (1988), Room Temperature (1990), Vox (1992), and The
Fermata (1994)—and one work of nonfiction, U and I (1991), in addition
to The Size of Thoughts. His essays have appeared in The New Yorker, The
Atlantic Monthly, The New York Review of Books, Esquire, and The Best
American Essays. He is married with two children.

FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, MARCH 1997
Copyright © 1982, 1983, 1984, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996 by Nicholson Baker
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in
the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and
simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in
hardcover by Random House, Inc., New York, in 1996.
The following pieces were first published in periodicals: “Changes of Mind,” “The Size of
Thoughts,” and “Rarity” in The Atlantic Monthly; “Ice Storm,” “Reading Aloud,” “The Projector,”
“Discards,” “Clip Art,” and “Books as Furniture” in The New Yorker; “The History of Punctuation”
and “Leading with the Grumper” in The New York Review of Books; “Model Airplanes” and “The
Northern Pedestal” in Esquire; and “A Novel by Alan Hollinghurst” in The London Review of Books.
The illustrations on this page and this page are copyright © 1994 by Mark Zingarelli.
The Library of Congress has cataloged the Random House edition as follows:
Baker, Nicholson.
The size of thoughts : essays and other lumber / Nicholson Baker—1st ed.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-30780751-9
I. Title.
PS3552.A4325S5 1996
814′.54—dc20 95-43667
Random House Web address: http://www.randomhouse.com/
v3.1
For my sister, Rachel
Contents
Cover
Other Books by This Author
About the Author
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
THOUGHT
Changes of Mind
The Size of Thoughts
Rarity
MACHINERY
Model Airplanes
The Projector
Clip Art
READING
Reading Aloud
The History of Punctuation
A Novel by Alan Hollinghurst
Leading with the Grumper
MIXED
The Northern Pedestal
Wedding
Mlack
Recipe
Ice Storm
LIBRARY SCIENCE
Discards
Books as Furniture
LUMBER
(i)
(ii)
(iii)
(iv)
(v)
(vi)
(vii)