The Know-It-All

The Know-It-All follows the endeavor of Esquire writer A.J. Jacobs to read through the entire Encyclopaedia Britannica. Fascinating overarching themes emerge across the historical record chronicled in the encyclopaedia articles: artists' and writers' suicide, war, invention, marrying your cousin, syphilis (not necessarily related to the prior item), insight, genius, luck. Jacobs interweaves his concurrent life story among the alphabetical review of EB material, and often, as it is said, life imitates art. This funny, cerebral, irreverent look at the world's premier body of accumulated facts [in thirty-two volumes, four pounds each, 33,000 pages, 65,000 articles, 44 million words, $1,400] will keep you laughing and thinking.