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Lists of Note: An Eclectic Collection Deserving of a Wider Audience
Lists of Note curates 125 unputdownable entries from a list of names that are as eclectic and intriguing as its contents, which include myriad reasons given by ancient Egyptians for missing work, Albert Einstein's demands of his estranged wife, F. Scott Fitzgerald's extensive conjugation of "to cocktail," and many more. Rarely intended for the public eye, these lists reveal hopes, priorities, and musings in a most engaging and entertaining way. Each transcript is accompanied by an artwork, most a captivating facsimile of the list itself. Richly visual and irresistibly readable, Lists of Note is a testament to the human urge to bring order to, poke fun at, and find meaning in the world around us—and is a gift of endless enjoyment and lasting value.
551 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 1, 2014
98 people are currently reading
1858 people want to read
About the author
Shaun Usher
48 books301 followersShaun Usher is a writer, editor, and compulsive collector of remarkable words. He is the author of Letters of Note, an international bestseller that began life as a blog and grew into a celebrated series of books and inspired the live stage show Letters Live, which he has co-produced since 2013. He has published 16 books so far, covering everything from love and grief to music, dogs, and outer space, and in October 2025 will release his 17th, Diaries of Note: 366 Lives, One Day at a Time, a curated journey through a year’s worth of diary entries from history. He lives in Manchester with his wife, Karina, and their three children.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 116 reviews
January 30, 2020
An interesting and unique idea with some lists that I enjoyed but most of them were boring? There were brief descriptions about each of the lists but I wish the author had given more of an explanation for why he included them like some kind of reasoning for the significance of the list. I didn't want to read a list of different words for being drunk or someone's shopping list. I did how ever enjoy the list of possible people who assassinated JFK and I found it really hilarious that Lyndon B. Johnson was at the top of the list. I think the problem is I expected it to be a nonfiction book but it's more a book you keep on a coffee table. It's fun to flip through but you're not going to learn much from it.
February 2, 2016
3.5 stars.
A bit inconsistent. Had some gems; interspersed with some truly uninteresting, almost irrelevant lists.
COOL THINGS YOU’LL FIND:
Einstein's incredibly demanding and somewhat demeaning conditions for the continuation of his marriage.
A list of workmen’s absences dating almost 3 thousand years ago.
Salem Witch Trials’ accused and accusers.
Darwin’s dad’s objections for his famous Beagle expedition.
A nineteen-year-old Newton’s list of sins written in code.
Random da Vinci’s to-do list.
Gandhi’s seven social sins, written for his thirteen-year-old grandson.
The interesting discovery that a 1976 John Lennon classified Paul as extraordinary, Ringo as friend, George as lost, and Elvis as fat.
A bit inconsistent. Had some gems; interspersed with some truly uninteresting, almost irrelevant lists.
COOL THINGS YOU’LL FIND:
Einstein's incredibly demanding and somewhat demeaning conditions for the continuation of his marriage.
A list of workmen’s absences dating almost 3 thousand years ago.
Salem Witch Trials’ accused and accusers.
Darwin’s dad’s objections for his famous Beagle expedition.
A nineteen-year-old Newton’s list of sins written in code.
Random da Vinci’s to-do list.
Gandhi’s seven social sins, written for his thirteen-year-old grandson.
The interesting discovery that a 1976 John Lennon classified Paul as extraordinary, Ringo as friend, George as lost, and Elvis as fat.
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April 9, 2022Notes on Lists
This is a beautiful, pricey, oversize book. (At least the copy I have is: it's published by Canongate and Unbound in the UK. I haven't seen the US edition.) It has lists made by a wide variety of people, from Robert Boyle to Susan Sontag, from Sei Shonagon to Noel Coward. Often it's scholarly as well as beautiful: Usher provides transliterations and translations, and the lists are reproduced in high-resolution photographs. Nick Cave's notebook looks like a precious ancient artifact. Some pages reproduce tattered sheets on papyrus and other materials--a shopping list written in Dunhuang, an Egyptian list of the meanings of dreams, a list of worker's absences written on a limestone ostracon. When Usher can't find the originals, he substitutes reproductions and photographs of the authors.
I bought this because of a long-standing interest in lists. (I've used them in several books, including a five-page list of words for failed art in "Art Critiques.") I was hoping for some insight into the aesthetics of lists, but in that respect Usher's book is a disappointment. His principal interest in lists seems to be their use in helping people organize and make sense of their lives. Sontag's list is a memo for herself on parenting; Coward's is a charter of friendship. There is also Ghandi's list of social sins,
Usher is also interested in lists that slightly disrupt our sense of artworks: for that there's Dickens's list of "available names" for characters, a list of alternatives to Rudolph (the red-nosed reindeer), and a list of Disney's alternate names for his Seven Dwarves.
But lists have a much more varied history (beyond popular culture and self-help) and there is a different reason for being interested in them now that Usher does not seem to care about. The first problem is historical: what are the histories of the list? And the second is critical.
1. The historical problem
It is reasonable to assume the list has diverse histories depending on its uses. A couple are represented, briefly, in "Lists of Note." Japanese literature might comprise one history in itself. "The Pillow Book" is mentioned in Usher's book, but it is largely disconnected from the majority of his entries, and from other Japanese examples such as Kenko. (Usher doesn't have a high-resolution color facsimile of an early edition, which may indicate his distance from that corpus.)
Another history might include lists drawn up by Renaissance humanists. Usher has two entries by Leonardo, but he misses Leonardo's Codex Trivulzianus, which is devoted entirely to lists. Rabelais would be a principal Renaissance source and precedent.
Artists' lists would be another lineage. Usher includes the Anthony Tommasini's list of favorite composers: Tommasini is a conservative classical music critic for the "New York Times," and his list is not interesting, but it is an example of a vast literature of artists' lists of their favorite artists. (Roger de Piles comes to mind as a premodern instance.)
Another kind of list, perhaps the most numerous, is the "laundry list"--business lists of trades, prices, employees, food, and so on. There are ancient lists in this book, but they play a minor role and don't fit well with the many entertaining popular culture entries. Ancient lists survive in many archaeological contexts and could have been a book in their own right.
And of course academics would always want to include the list Foucault attributes to "a Chinese encyclopedia" in "The Order of Things" (there is a good study of the source of the list, which leads through Borges but is still unidentified). Foucault's list stands in not only for epistemologically disordered lists, but also for surrealist juxtapositions in general.
These are random thoughts: I'm not aware of any historical reviews of the concept of the list. There is an essay by William Gass, "I've Got a Little List" (thanks to Dan Weiskopf for alerting me to this; it's in "Salmaundi," 1996), but I do not know any historical treatments.
2. The critical problem
I am more concerned with the fact that there is a different reason why a book of lists should be published today: experimental or "conceptual" writing is deeply involved in the concept of the list, and that is what could make a book like this timely rather than arbitrary. Usher does include one list by Georges Perec, but he seems uninterested in contemporary lists by experimental writers. The book "Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing" (2011) has enough such lists in it to count as an anthology of lists in its own right. (And it might have been a more interesting book if it had included the lovely color facsimiles Usher reprints, especially because conceptual poets are often involved in typography and layout.) Here's an arbitrarily chosen, incomplete list of examples of this different kind of list:
A. David Antin's "A List of Delusions of the Insane: What They Are Afraid Of" which begins:
the police
being poisoned
being killed
being alone
being attacked in the night
being poor
being followed at night
B. Charles Bernstein's "I and The," a list of words in order of their frequency in English, arranged into three-word lines:
I and the
to that you
it of a
know was uh
in but is
this me about
just don't my
what I'm like
C. Michael Gottlieb's "The Dust," a list of things found after 9/11, which begins:
UHF Tower Mast A
VHF Main Antenna Bracing, Southeast
Left Rear Wheel Assembly, Retractor
Radome Array
First Class Galley Convection Oven Number One
First Class Galley Convection Oven Number Two
There are hundreds more lists in "Against Expression," and several thousand more on the internet and published as artist's books and with small presses.
I don't mean to imply lists like these form a coherent, single movement, although the editors of "Against Expression," Kenny Goldsmith and Craig Dworkin, claim that they do. I think there's some basic work to be done distinguishing lists that have been made by contemporary writers with the intent of avoiding or erasing conventional writerly expressiveness (this is a claim Dworkin and Goldsmith make), and lists that have been made with the intention of recovering genuine expressiveness from the few places where it can still be found, such as dictionaries and apparently impersonal collections (this is a claim both editors also make).
"Against Expression" is deeply self-contradictory in its aims, but it is firmly contemporary. "Lists of Note" is genial, beautifully done, and entertaining, but has no special claim on history or the present except for the list's intrinsic power of cutting across cultural contexts.
3. Philosophical questions
Partly aside from historical genealogies and current critical questions, there could also be a philosophy of lists. Again, I don't know such a study. William Gass's essay comes close, and it's also, as usually, unremittingly poetic. One of his observations seems a nice point on which to close: "Normally," he writes, "lists are the purposeful coming together of names like starlings to their evening trees. They tend to confer equality on their members, also like starlings in their evening trees."
This is a beautiful, pricey, oversize book. (At least the copy I have is: it's published by Canongate and Unbound in the UK. I haven't seen the US edition.) It has lists made by a wide variety of people, from Robert Boyle to Susan Sontag, from Sei Shonagon to Noel Coward. Often it's scholarly as well as beautiful: Usher provides transliterations and translations, and the lists are reproduced in high-resolution photographs. Nick Cave's notebook looks like a precious ancient artifact. Some pages reproduce tattered sheets on papyrus and other materials--a shopping list written in Dunhuang, an Egyptian list of the meanings of dreams, a list of worker's absences written on a limestone ostracon. When Usher can't find the originals, he substitutes reproductions and photographs of the authors.
I bought this because of a long-standing interest in lists. (I've used them in several books, including a five-page list of words for failed art in "Art Critiques.") I was hoping for some insight into the aesthetics of lists, but in that respect Usher's book is a disappointment. His principal interest in lists seems to be their use in helping people organize and make sense of their lives. Sontag's list is a memo for herself on parenting; Coward's is a charter of friendship. There is also Ghandi's list of social sins,
Usher is also interested in lists that slightly disrupt our sense of artworks: for that there's Dickens's list of "available names" for characters, a list of alternatives to Rudolph (the red-nosed reindeer), and a list of Disney's alternate names for his Seven Dwarves.
But lists have a much more varied history (beyond popular culture and self-help) and there is a different reason for being interested in them now that Usher does not seem to care about. The first problem is historical: what are the histories of the list? And the second is critical.
1. The historical problem
It is reasonable to assume the list has diverse histories depending on its uses. A couple are represented, briefly, in "Lists of Note." Japanese literature might comprise one history in itself. "The Pillow Book" is mentioned in Usher's book, but it is largely disconnected from the majority of his entries, and from other Japanese examples such as Kenko. (Usher doesn't have a high-resolution color facsimile of an early edition, which may indicate his distance from that corpus.)
Another history might include lists drawn up by Renaissance humanists. Usher has two entries by Leonardo, but he misses Leonardo's Codex Trivulzianus, which is devoted entirely to lists. Rabelais would be a principal Renaissance source and precedent.
Artists' lists would be another lineage. Usher includes the Anthony Tommasini's list of favorite composers: Tommasini is a conservative classical music critic for the "New York Times," and his list is not interesting, but it is an example of a vast literature of artists' lists of their favorite artists. (Roger de Piles comes to mind as a premodern instance.)
Another kind of list, perhaps the most numerous, is the "laundry list"--business lists of trades, prices, employees, food, and so on. There are ancient lists in this book, but they play a minor role and don't fit well with the many entertaining popular culture entries. Ancient lists survive in many archaeological contexts and could have been a book in their own right.
And of course academics would always want to include the list Foucault attributes to "a Chinese encyclopedia" in "The Order of Things" (there is a good study of the source of the list, which leads through Borges but is still unidentified). Foucault's list stands in not only for epistemologically disordered lists, but also for surrealist juxtapositions in general.
These are random thoughts: I'm not aware of any historical reviews of the concept of the list. There is an essay by William Gass, "I've Got a Little List" (thanks to Dan Weiskopf for alerting me to this; it's in "Salmaundi," 1996), but I do not know any historical treatments.
2. The critical problem
I am more concerned with the fact that there is a different reason why a book of lists should be published today: experimental or "conceptual" writing is deeply involved in the concept of the list, and that is what could make a book like this timely rather than arbitrary. Usher does include one list by Georges Perec, but he seems uninterested in contemporary lists by experimental writers. The book "Against Expression: An Anthology of Conceptual Writing" (2011) has enough such lists in it to count as an anthology of lists in its own right. (And it might have been a more interesting book if it had included the lovely color facsimiles Usher reprints, especially because conceptual poets are often involved in typography and layout.) Here's an arbitrarily chosen, incomplete list of examples of this different kind of list:
A. David Antin's "A List of Delusions of the Insane: What They Are Afraid Of" which begins:
the police
being poisoned
being killed
being alone
being attacked in the night
being poor
being followed at night
B. Charles Bernstein's "I and The," a list of words in order of their frequency in English, arranged into three-word lines:
I and the
to that you
it of a
know was uh
in but is
this me about
just don't my
what I'm like
C. Michael Gottlieb's "The Dust," a list of things found after 9/11, which begins:
UHF Tower Mast A
VHF Main Antenna Bracing, Southeast
Left Rear Wheel Assembly, Retractor
Radome Array
First Class Galley Convection Oven Number One
First Class Galley Convection Oven Number Two
There are hundreds more lists in "Against Expression," and several thousand more on the internet and published as artist's books and with small presses.
I don't mean to imply lists like these form a coherent, single movement, although the editors of "Against Expression," Kenny Goldsmith and Craig Dworkin, claim that they do. I think there's some basic work to be done distinguishing lists that have been made by contemporary writers with the intent of avoiding or erasing conventional writerly expressiveness (this is a claim Dworkin and Goldsmith make), and lists that have been made with the intention of recovering genuine expressiveness from the few places where it can still be found, such as dictionaries and apparently impersonal collections (this is a claim both editors also make).
"Against Expression" is deeply self-contradictory in its aims, but it is firmly contemporary. "Lists of Note" is genial, beautifully done, and entertaining, but has no special claim on history or the present except for the list's intrinsic power of cutting across cultural contexts.
3. Philosophical questions
Partly aside from historical genealogies and current critical questions, there could also be a philosophy of lists. Again, I don't know such a study. William Gass's essay comes close, and it's also, as usually, unremittingly poetic. One of his observations seems a nice point on which to close: "Normally," he writes, "lists are the purposeful coming together of names like starlings to their evening trees. They tend to confer equality on their members, also like starlings in their evening trees."
February 9, 2015
Some fascinating and amusing snippets in here, but unfortunately very male-centric. Less than one fifth of the lists are by women.
One particular list stood out - Gandhi's list/letter to his grandson in 1947: "the seven blunders that human society commits, and that cause all the violence...
Wealth without work.
Pleasure without conscience.
Knowledge without character.
Commerce without morality.
Science without humanity.
Worship without sacrifice.
Politics without principles."
One particular list stood out - Gandhi's list/letter to his grandson in 1947: "the seven blunders that human society commits, and that cause all the violence...
Wealth without work.
Pleasure without conscience.
Knowledge without character.
Commerce without morality.
Science without humanity.
Worship without sacrifice.
Politics without principles."
August 16, 2019
Not as good as Letters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience. But then that makes sense b/c a letter is much more interesting than a list. Still, a feast for the eyes and beautifully presented.
October 19, 2015
I thought I wouldn't like it because I didn't relate to some of the lists but instead it inspired to create some of my own. These lists have hidden meaning and deep understanding and I know some of them were written in a spur of a moment but it really is interesting to see what is going on in the minds of some of the most interesting people in the world.
July 22, 2017
Very good coffee table book, but at times very uninteresting. I was hoping to read it almost straight through when I started after glancing through it at a bookstore, but unfortunately ended up skipping through. I learned a lot, though, but mostly from the introductions to each list versus the lists themselves.
July 30, 2015
Super cute book of notable lists, including the cast of The Godfather and a "Love List" made by Harry S. Truman.
June 23, 2020
Lists comfort me. If a day goes by where I haven't made a list for practical reasons, it's probably true that I've made one for fun. And afterall, Goodreads is basically one huge list is it not? And I'm on here all the time. So you can see why I'd immediately be intrigued by a book all about lists!
I got nine lists in before I realised unironically I was making a list of my favourite lists in this book, and I thought I'd include it here.
My favourite lists included:
1. The Drinker's Dictionary by Benjamin Franklin (No.9)
2. Predictions for the year 2000 by Robert Heinlein (No.16)
3. Workmen's absences, circa 1250 BC (No.33)
4. Wartime Golf Rules (No.20)
5. The Dream Book, circa 1220 BC (No.17)
6. Marilyn Monroe's Dream Lovers (No.113)
7. Rules of Parenting by Susan Sontag (No.21)
8. Gobblefunk by Roald Dahl (No.36)
9. Potential names for the Disney dwarfs (No.19)
10. Alternative names for Disney movies by Ed Gombert (No.26)
11. The Fake Books of Charles Dickens (No.85)
12. Back to School Commandments by Sylvia Plath (No.55)
13. Suggested Names For a Ford Car by Marianne Moore (No.119)
14. The Invention of Basketball by James Naismith (No.102)
15. Available Names by Charles Dickens (No.78)
16. Simple Rules for Life in London by Rudyard Kipling (No.84)
17. Prescriptions For Feeling Low by Sydney Smith (No.79)
18. A Conjugation List of the Word Cocktail by F. Scott Fitzgerald (No.81)
One criticism I would have is that some of the subject matter I just don't care for. For example, there was a list by two men who I wouldn't have heard of if the author hadn't put a description in explaining their relevance, and their list was things they had contempt for. Most of which was women doing pretty much anything. For such a novelty book, you'd think the author would understand that I don't want to read multiple pages of misogyny. Maybe the author was running out of lists to include. I thought a lot of the lists were just a bit boring too. It was also very male-centric with barely any of the lists created by women. Also, the author definitely missed the chance to make his Acknowledgments into a list.
A lot of research obviously went into this book and I think it paid off. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who finds even a quarter as much joy as I find in lists. And even if lists aren't especially you're thing, I think there's something for everyone in the book.
BTW- my official rating for this is 3.5.
I got nine lists in before I realised unironically I was making a list of my favourite lists in this book, and I thought I'd include it here.
My favourite lists included:
1. The Drinker's Dictionary by Benjamin Franklin (No.9)
2. Predictions for the year 2000 by Robert Heinlein (No.16)
3. Workmen's absences, circa 1250 BC (No.33)
4. Wartime Golf Rules (No.20)
5. The Dream Book, circa 1220 BC (No.17)
6. Marilyn Monroe's Dream Lovers (No.113)
7. Rules of Parenting by Susan Sontag (No.21)
8. Gobblefunk by Roald Dahl (No.36)
9. Potential names for the Disney dwarfs (No.19)
10. Alternative names for Disney movies by Ed Gombert (No.26)
11. The Fake Books of Charles Dickens (No.85)
12. Back to School Commandments by Sylvia Plath (No.55)
13. Suggested Names For a Ford Car by Marianne Moore (No.119)
14. The Invention of Basketball by James Naismith (No.102)
15. Available Names by Charles Dickens (No.78)
16. Simple Rules for Life in London by Rudyard Kipling (No.84)
17. Prescriptions For Feeling Low by Sydney Smith (No.79)
18. A Conjugation List of the Word Cocktail by F. Scott Fitzgerald (No.81)
One criticism I would have is that some of the subject matter I just don't care for. For example, there was a list by two men who I wouldn't have heard of if the author hadn't put a description in explaining their relevance, and their list was things they had contempt for. Most of which was women doing pretty much anything. For such a novelty book, you'd think the author would understand that I don't want to read multiple pages of misogyny. Maybe the author was running out of lists to include. I thought a lot of the lists were just a bit boring too. It was also very male-centric with barely any of the lists created by women. Also, the author definitely missed the chance to make his Acknowledgments into a list.
A lot of research obviously went into this book and I think it paid off. I would definitely recommend this to anyone who finds even a quarter as much joy as I find in lists. And even if lists aren't especially you're thing, I think there's something for everyone in the book.
BTW- my official rating for this is 3.5.
July 29, 2020
A fun compendium of lists made by authors, scientists, actors, sports figures, politicians, rock stars, and more. I especially enjoyed the following, which is just a small sampling of the 125 lists:
1. Chrissie Hynde's "Advice to Chick Rockers" ("6. Don't think that sticking your boobs out and trying to look fuckable will help. Remember, you're in a rock and roll band. It's not 'fuck me,' it's 'fuck you'!") Haha!
2. Walt Disney's list of possible names for the seven dwarves, including Blabby, Hotsy, Strutty, and Thrifty.
3. Jack Kerouac's "Belief & Technique for Modern Prose," including "Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind."
4. Reasons for admission to the West Virginia Hospital for the Insane. These include cerebral softening, egotism, ill treatment by husband, masturbation for 30 years, and novel reading!
5. Raymond Chandler's "Similes and Comparisons," which include "His face was long enough to wrap twice around his neck" and "So tight his head squeaks when he takes his hat off."
1. Chrissie Hynde's "Advice to Chick Rockers" ("6. Don't think that sticking your boobs out and trying to look fuckable will help. Remember, you're in a rock and roll band. It's not 'fuck me,' it's 'fuck you'!") Haha!
2. Walt Disney's list of possible names for the seven dwarves, including Blabby, Hotsy, Strutty, and Thrifty.
3. Jack Kerouac's "Belief & Technique for Modern Prose," including "Be crazy dumbsaint of the mind."
4. Reasons for admission to the West Virginia Hospital for the Insane. These include cerebral softening, egotism, ill treatment by husband, masturbation for 30 years, and novel reading!
5. Raymond Chandler's "Similes and Comparisons," which include "His face was long enough to wrap twice around his neck" and "So tight his head squeaks when he takes his hat off."
March 16, 2024
Coffee table type book making it a bit hard to actually read. Enjoys pursing through the lists and finding those that interested me. A very eclectic mix of lists, which was fun.
September 22, 2016
This is an absolutely brilliant book. It contains 125 lists created by a vast range of people - historically significant to not-so-significant. Favorites include a list of proposed titles for Julia Child's famous cook book and a list of fifty names for the dwarfs before the final seven were selected. Some are ancient, some are recent. There are lists by Johnny Cash, Thomas Edison, Martin Luther King Jr. and Leonardo DaVinci. I read this cover to cover, but it's the kind of thing that can be browsed at your leisure. Seriously, check your library for this because it was stellar.
January 2, 2017
Após ler o ma-ra-vi-lho-so Cartas Extraordinárias em 2015, dar 5 estrelas, favoritar e elevar a obra ao patamar de livro indispensável da minha humilde biblioteca, não pude me conter ao ver o Listas Extraordinárias em pré-venda. Na primeira queda de preço, caí em tentação (obrigada Amazon por sempre me deixar um pouco mais pobre financeiramente, amo vocês).
O objetivo de Shaun Usher nesse livro é muito simples: compilar as listas mais interessantes (segundo ele) que foram encontradas durante suas pesquisas para a produção de Cartas Extraordinárias, mostrando-nos que desde sempre temos a obsessão de organizar, priorizar e classificar coisas. Qualquer coisa.
A ideia é empolgante e empolgada estava eu quando o livro chegou. Uma pena que não durou muito.
O livro possui 125 listas e apesar de algumas serem adoráveis e com lições para a vida, como a que F. Scott Fitzgerald fez para sua filha Scottie, ou esclarecedoras, que nem a sete pecados sociais segundo Mohandas Gandhi, a maioria serve para saciar aquela curiosidade que você nem sabia que tinha e que, após a leitura, continua não tendo. Listas demasiadas longas tais como “coisas em andamento e por fazer” de Thomas Edison e “presentes de ano-novo para sua majestade” por Elizabeth I (16 páginas!) me deixaram um tanto quanto entediada. Sentimento este que não senti em momento algum na minha leitura de Cartas Extraordinárias e que me fez pular páginas para terminar logo.
A edição da Companhia das Letras é impecável, o livro é lindo! Papel de ótima qualidade, muitas fotos e fac-símiles e uma pequena introdução antes das listas para contextualização.
Vá direto para: listas sobre livros, claro! Em especial a de nº 117, retirada de “Se um viajante numa noite de inverno”, livro de Italo Calvino, e que é ótima para classificar todos os milhares de livros que temos em casa e os que queremos comprar também.
https://themagicyearsofreading.tumblr...
O objetivo de Shaun Usher nesse livro é muito simples: compilar as listas mais interessantes (segundo ele) que foram encontradas durante suas pesquisas para a produção de Cartas Extraordinárias, mostrando-nos que desde sempre temos a obsessão de organizar, priorizar e classificar coisas. Qualquer coisa.
A ideia é empolgante e empolgada estava eu quando o livro chegou. Uma pena que não durou muito.
O livro possui 125 listas e apesar de algumas serem adoráveis e com lições para a vida, como a que F. Scott Fitzgerald fez para sua filha Scottie, ou esclarecedoras, que nem a sete pecados sociais segundo Mohandas Gandhi, a maioria serve para saciar aquela curiosidade que você nem sabia que tinha e que, após a leitura, continua não tendo. Listas demasiadas longas tais como “coisas em andamento e por fazer” de Thomas Edison e “presentes de ano-novo para sua majestade” por Elizabeth I (16 páginas!) me deixaram um tanto quanto entediada. Sentimento este que não senti em momento algum na minha leitura de Cartas Extraordinárias e que me fez pular páginas para terminar logo.
A edição da Companhia das Letras é impecável, o livro é lindo! Papel de ótima qualidade, muitas fotos e fac-símiles e uma pequena introdução antes das listas para contextualização.
Vá direto para: listas sobre livros, claro! Em especial a de nº 117, retirada de “Se um viajante numa noite de inverno”, livro de Italo Calvino, e que é ótima para classificar todos os milhares de livros que temos em casa e os que queremos comprar também.
https://themagicyearsofreading.tumblr...
May 10, 2016
Bought this book as I buy many books, feeling happy and elated with life, browsing books, feeling too happy probably. After buying, I thought, why in the hell did I buy this dumb book? But you know, it was not a mistake. Filled with wildly diverse and shockingly interesting lists, if there is such a thing. Sometimes those feel-good bookstore impulses steer you right.
March 1, 2022
Lists of Note ist eine Sammlung von Listen. To-Do-Listen, Einkaufslisten, Wunschlisten, Checklisten, Adresslisten, Wörterlisten, Lieblingslisten.
Listen wirken so, als ob sie (teilweise) das Chaos (im Kopf, im Haushalt, im Leben) ordnen und sortieren können. Shaun Usher hat erneut Archive durchstöbert und lustige, kuriose und berührende Listen zusammengetragen.
Listen wirken so, als ob sie (teilweise) das Chaos (im Kopf, im Haushalt, im Leben) ordnen und sortieren können. Shaun Usher hat erneut Archive durchstöbert und lustige, kuriose und berührende Listen zusammengetragen.
July 4, 2015
My kind of book. Ben Franklin's list of words for drunkenness (dozens). Charles Dickens's list of fake titles for fake books in his Barbary. A list of reasons for absenteeism on an ancient work site (brewing beer). Much more.
July 5, 2016
Ma liste préfereé : No. 036 - Gobblefunk, en incluant let mots inventés « mirabuleux » et « nobstacle » du livre « Le bon gros géant » (traduction Gallimard Folio Junior de 1984) ! Puis No. 124 : « Keep the juices flowin' by janglin' 'round gently as you move » (Satchel Paige).
December 27, 2015
A great little gem. There is a plethora of list types featured, touching on being funny, poignant, sad, and reflective. Vonnegut's contract with his wife is particularly enjoyable.
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July 25, 2021Beautiful book and some great content, but I’m afraid lists weren’t as interesting to read as letters. But there is wonderful value here.
April 26, 2026
”Books You Haven't Read;
the Books You Needn't Read;
the Books Made For Purposes Other Than Reading;
Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong To The Category Of Books Read Before Being Written;
the Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered;
the Books You Mean To Read But There Are Others You Must Read First;
the Books Too Expensive Now And You'll Wait Till They're Remaindered;
the Books ditto When They Come Out In Paperback;
Books You Can Borrow From Somebody;
Books That Everybody's Read So It's As If You Had Read Them, Too;
the Books You've Been Planning to Read for Ages;
the Books You've Been Hunting for Years Without Success;
the Books Dealing With Something You're Working On At The Moment;
the Books You Want to Own So They'll Be Handy Just in Case;
the Books You Could Put Aside Maybe To Read This Summer;
the Books You Need To Go With Other Books On Your Shelves;
the Books That Fill You With Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified;
the Books Read Long Ago Which It's Now Time To Reread;
the Books You've Always Pretended To Have Read And Now It's Time To Sit Down And Really Read Them;
the New Books Whose Author Or Subject Appeals To You;
the New Books By Authors Or On Subjects Not New (for you or in general);
New Books By Authors Or On Subjects Completely Unknown (at least to you)” - Italo Calvino
I love me a good list and was excited to see that someone tried to compile the best ones our species have written thus far. I cannot tell if lists are far less interesting than I thought or if Shaun Usher needed to spend more time in libraries trying to find lists. So many of these lists are just kind of boring or bleh (I hope to never again read so many shopping lists in one sitting).
Not everything in here was a letdown and I learned some interesting historical tidbits, soooo I guess we’ll meet halfway and go with three stars? Definitely page through this if you see it at the library
My Top 10 List of Facts/Lists/Quotes From This Book (in no particular order:
1. Meat carving was considered a fine art in the Middle Ages
2. Susan Sontag's parenting advice: ”3. Don’t praise him for something I wouldn’t always accept as good… 10. Don’t assume that what I don’t like to do (bath, hair wash) he won’t like either.”
3. Charles Darwin’s father did not want him to go to South America: ”it would be a useless undertaking”
4. Sei Shōnagon’s 10th century cynical view of relationships: ”Rare Things: Two women, let alone a man and a woman, who vow themselves to each other forever, and actually manage to remain on good terms to the end.”
5. Hillary North’s tragic list after 9/11 describing how her life changed: ”I can no longer ride the elevator with Barbara. I can no longer be happy about Jennifer's pregnancy. I can no longer walk with Adam. I can no longer say hello to Steven every morning. I can no longer see the incredible view from the 103d Floor of the South Tower. I can no longer take my life for granted.”
6. Sylvia Plath's back to school rules: “9. Remember: 5 months is not eternity. 2 months is not eternity. Even if it looks that way now. 10. Attitude is everything: so KEEP CHEERFUL, even if you fail your science, your unit, get a hateful silence from Myron, no dates, no praise, no love, nothing. There is a certain clinical satisfaction in seeing just how bad things can get.”
7. The outrageously long list of reasons for admitting people to the West Virginia Hospital For the Insane used from 1864 - 1889
8. Bertrand Russell’s Liberal Decalogue from 1951: ”1. Do not feel absolutely certain of anything […] 10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool’s paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness.”
9. The letter of advice Anton Chekhov wrote his brother in 1886: ”You must work at it constantly, day and night. You must never stop reading, studying in depth, exercising your will. Every hour is precious.”
10. Richard Watts writing in his nuclear chain reaction notebook ”We’re Cookin” the moment fission occurred.
November 21, 2017
The act of note-taking is prerogative of humans throughout the history of civilization; impromptu, interesting, and important, the nature of notetaking is to capture a train of thoughts that comes to one's mind. This book by Shaun Usher is a pleasant compilation of such notes flooding vicissitudes of humankind. It is a sequence to his bestseller Letters of Note, which is a riveting compendium of letters of all kinds throughout the history of the world. Mr. Usher, who is very keen on collecting personal correspondence of people, has indeed again exerted great effort and time to make this project possible through the support of his fans via Unbound com, an organization which has helped writers publish their works since the 18th Century in England.
The book contains some very intriguing notes as follows: (1) Bill of Mortality which tells of the kinds of ailment English people of the 17th century died from, (and the reader will be surprised to find that one of the common causes of death was abscess); (2) an ancient Egyptian worker's notes on his absences recorded on a limestone; (3) Leonardo Da Vinci's notes on what he would need to research for the anatomy of a man, Michaelangelo's notes on a list of food he wanted to eat with adorable pictures accompanied during his traveling to and from Pietrasanta to extract marble used for the Basilica of San Lorenzo; (4) Sir Isaac Newton's list of notes revealing his peevishness with his mother and father, striking his sister and servant and neglecting to listen to a Sunday sermon in church.; (5) Mark Twain's list of note showing all the food he wanted to eat at home upon his returning from a long European trip; (6) Marilyn Monroe's resolution to attend her new acting class without fail and to enroll in an English Literature class; and Jack Kerouac's note to his friend for writing tips in which he asserted free writing without grammatical, syntactical, and literary inhibition. These are just a few notable excerpts from the book, and the reader will have no time for boredom in reading this book.
This is a quick read which one can enjoy without having to analyze the contents of the notes. The only foible about this read in Kindle version is that the original script of some of the notes are not clearly shown due to a mechanical aspect of the device. For this reason, it will be better to own a hard copy of the book as the notes are pictured in their entirety, so that the reader can see clearly the writing styles and discern the personalities and characters of the notetakers to a certain extent. The reader will realize that the act of note-taking, however simplistic and insignificant it may seem, is in fact a way of sketching the flow of thought from the world full of things assorted and flowing without a sense of purpose for composite significance.
The book contains some very intriguing notes as follows: (1) Bill of Mortality which tells of the kinds of ailment English people of the 17th century died from, (and the reader will be surprised to find that one of the common causes of death was abscess); (2) an ancient Egyptian worker's notes on his absences recorded on a limestone; (3) Leonardo Da Vinci's notes on what he would need to research for the anatomy of a man, Michaelangelo's notes on a list of food he wanted to eat with adorable pictures accompanied during his traveling to and from Pietrasanta to extract marble used for the Basilica of San Lorenzo; (4) Sir Isaac Newton's list of notes revealing his peevishness with his mother and father, striking his sister and servant and neglecting to listen to a Sunday sermon in church.; (5) Mark Twain's list of note showing all the food he wanted to eat at home upon his returning from a long European trip; (6) Marilyn Monroe's resolution to attend her new acting class without fail and to enroll in an English Literature class; and Jack Kerouac's note to his friend for writing tips in which he asserted free writing without grammatical, syntactical, and literary inhibition. These are just a few notable excerpts from the book, and the reader will have no time for boredom in reading this book.
This is a quick read which one can enjoy without having to analyze the contents of the notes. The only foible about this read in Kindle version is that the original script of some of the notes are not clearly shown due to a mechanical aspect of the device. For this reason, it will be better to own a hard copy of the book as the notes are pictured in their entirety, so that the reader can see clearly the writing styles and discern the personalities and characters of the notetakers to a certain extent. The reader will realize that the act of note-taking, however simplistic and insignificant it may seem, is in fact a way of sketching the flow of thought from the world full of things assorted and flowing without a sense of purpose for composite significance.
December 14, 2017
Demorei para pensar na nota que daria para este livro, principalmente pela seguinte dúvida: "como devo avaliar uma compilação?". Antes disso, no entanto, devo dizer que me interessei por essa obra depois de ler Cartas Extraordinárias, do mesmo autor, um livro que - apesar de algumas falhas pontuais- me agradou bastante. O maior problema deste volume é que, diferentemente do anterior, ele possui muito mais falhas e materiais simplesmente desinteressantes para o público leitor... Fui praticamente obrigado a pular algumas páginas das extensas listas de compras, de presentes ou de vernáculos exóticos que compõem o livro.
Fiquei matutando depois sobre como avaliar a obra. Já que Shaun Usher não escreveu nenhum dos textos que me aborreceram, a culpa não seria dos escritores destes tópicos enfadonhos? A conclusão que cheguei é que não. Muitos dos célebres autores criaram suas listas apenas com uma finalidade utilitária, sem pensarem que um dia elas poderiam chegar aos leitores. Quem decidiu que elas constituem um material relevante foi o próprio Usher, que terminou preenchendo ao menos metade de sua obra com listas que são, em última análise, chatas e tediosas. Por essa razão, posso dizer que o livro não cumpriu seu objetivo e, assim sendo, não me resta outra alternativa: avalio-o com 2 estrelas.
Fiquei matutando depois sobre como avaliar a obra. Já que Shaun Usher não escreveu nenhum dos textos que me aborreceram, a culpa não seria dos escritores destes tópicos enfadonhos? A conclusão que cheguei é que não. Muitos dos célebres autores criaram suas listas apenas com uma finalidade utilitária, sem pensarem que um dia elas poderiam chegar aos leitores. Quem decidiu que elas constituem um material relevante foi o próprio Usher, que terminou preenchendo ao menos metade de sua obra com listas que são, em última análise, chatas e tediosas. Por essa razão, posso dizer que o livro não cumpriu seu objetivo e, assim sendo, não me resta outra alternativa: avalio-o com 2 estrelas.
August 9, 2023
Lots of interesting lists from famous and unknown people. I liked the ones for brainstorming names and titles best. There's many lists of advice, but none I felt were worth copying. (Safire's Fumblerules of Grammer is pretty damn good though.) There's also several examples of dictionaries and other word lists, like Benjamin Franklin's Drinkers Dictionary. Some are prosaic, like the first one, which is Johnny Cash's "Things to Do Today!" list. (Kissing June a few times is a must!) Then there's the more formal records, such as a (very long) list of Christmas gifts for Queen Elizabeth I. Lastly, if you're stumped for writing prompts, check out Lovecraft's Weird Ideas list of plots for the picking. Definitely an oversize book that'd get some perusal on the old coffee table.
December 2, 2018
I'm of two minds about this book. Even though the curation has a lot of work behind, this book is hardly the compendium of inspiration that I expected. The book has some interesting variety and among several uninteresting lists there *are* seeds of inspiration and example to be learned from others.
In my digital edition, some of the lists are presented in image form, and they were quite low resolution, which didn't help to extract the contents of the list. Fortunately, this is not the rule and some of those images are transcrpited.
Overall interesting but not life changing. Get it if you really, really want to.
In my digital edition, some of the lists are presented in image form, and they were quite low resolution, which didn't help to extract the contents of the list. Fortunately, this is not the rule and some of those images are transcrpited.
Overall interesting but not life changing. Get it if you really, really want to.
December 4, 2021
Deși e mai puțin faimoasă decât sora ”Letters of Note”, este o lectură super rapidă și interesantă, în special pentru iubitorii de liste și de cultură generală. ”Lists of Note” este o colecție de liste, cu ilustrații și scurte explicații despre contextul acestora, ale variatelor personalități din diferite domenii, aranjate cronologic.
Dacă ești curios, poți citi lista de cumpărături a lui Galileo, lista echipei Disney cu cele 50 de nume potențiale pentru cei 7 pitici din Albă-ca-Zăpada sau chiar lista lui Edith Wharton conținând cărțile sale preferate, în 1909.
Dacă ești curios, poți citi lista de cumpărături a lui Galileo, lista echipei Disney cu cele 50 de nume potențiale pentru cei 7 pitici din Albă-ca-Zăpada sau chiar lista lui Edith Wharton conținând cărțile sale preferate, în 1909.
July 6, 2017
Lists of note is a hodge lodge of lists from notable persons across fields of accomplishment and time periods. It is a book of curiosities, but lacks a well considered theme excepting lists from famous persons. Some of the lists read as Medium articles, outlining prudent ways of living, rules for success, etc. Others are interesting historical relics *as* lists but are sometimes monotonous and other times of no value except to a historian or academic specific to that list's historical context.
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March 1, 2020Lists. Doesn't get better than lists. Such an entertaining large format book to breeze through and then read again. Different lists for different folk. I would have liked to see more lists from women. Some of my favorites:
* Harry S Truman's love lists to his wife Bess for 53 years on their anniversary
* William Safire's Fumblerules of Grammar
* James Thurber's rules for writing
* Tina Feys Body Parts for Which I am Grateful
* Alternate cast list for The Godfather
* Harry S Truman's love lists to his wife Bess for 53 years on their anniversary
* William Safire's Fumblerules of Grammar
* James Thurber's rules for writing
* Tina Feys Body Parts for Which I am Grateful
* Alternate cast list for The Godfather
December 26, 2021
I've always been a list maker. Sometimes in the extreme, as my sister would tell you. So imagine my delight when I came across this book that contains lists of note! For the most part, this was pretty interesting and entertaining. Some of the lists left me scratching my head--as to why they were included--but more than one of them made me laugh out loud. This was enjoyable to read and list at a time throughout the course of the fall months into the holidays.
February 19, 2020
Есть весьма интересные списки, но по сравнению с письмами тут больший уклон в сторону развлекательности, в итоге от большого обьема книги полезного для меня оказалось не более 20-25 %. Тем не менее, списки Лавкрафта, Уайлдера, Чехова, правила для велосипедисток и поправила грамматики читал с удовольствием.
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