Shaun Usher - Lists of Note: An Eclectic Collection Deserving of a Wider Audience

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To get you started, here is a 5 discount on your first pledge. Just visit unbound.com, make your pledge and type 3LION in the promo code box when you check out. Thank you for your support, Dan, Justin and John Founders, Unbound Introduction Johnny Cash Wynkyn de Worde Georges Perec Evelyn Lincoln Pablo Picasso Alice Reighly Robert Boyle Ratnav r . k s . a and Praketu Benjamin Franklin Edmund Wilson E. Cotes George Washington Gene Autry Chrissie Hynde Peter Roget Robert Heinlein Author Unknown Nick Cave Disney Richmond Golf Club Susan Sontag Selznick International Pictures Don Saltero Geoffrey Handley-Taylor The Mafia Ed Gombert Harry Gibson Albert Einstein Julia Child Clara Barton Author Unknown Rolande Barthes Author Unknown Martin Luther King Victor Lustig Roald Dahl Leonardo da Vinci Queen Elizabeth I Charles Darwin Woody Guthrie Marilyn Monroe Nol Coward Mark Twain Sir Isaac Newton Sei S h - onagon Walt Whitman The Ladies Pocket Magazine Norman Mailer Author Unknown Robert May Leonardo da Vinci Hilary North Henry David Thoreau Jack Kerouac Sylvia Plath Jonathan Swift Harry Houdini West Virginia Hospital for the Insane Thomas Nashe Author Unknown Thelonious Monk Galileo Galilei Corita Kent Harry S.

Truman David Ogilvy David Markson H.P. Lovecraft William Safire Christopher Hitchens Author Unknown Edna Woolman Chase Walker Evans and James Agee Charles Green Shaw Lucas Armory James Thurber Francis Ford Coppola Dr. John Jones Charles Dickens Sydney Smith Eero Saarinen F. Scott Fitzgerald Henry Miller A.T. (Practitioner in phisicke and chirurgerie.) Rudyard Kipling Charles Dickens Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America Charles Darwin Kurt Vonnegut Thomas Jefferson Captain Beefheart Thomas Edison Preston Sturges Thomas Harman Paramount Mohandas Gandhi Tina Fey Michelangelo Raymond Chandler F. Scott Fitzgerald John Lennon Ernest Hemingway James Naismith Unique Cycling Club of Chicago Benjamin Franklin Mark Twain Edith Wharton Jorge Luis Borges Bertrand Russell Philip Henslowe David Foster Wallace Thomas Edison F.

Scott Fitzgerald Marilyn Monroe Anton Chekhov Theodore Roosevelt Frank Lloyd Wright Italo Calvino Richard Serra Marianne Moore Billy Wilder Sid Vicious Kurt Cobain Edmund Wilson Satchel Paige Richard Watts
Introduction Since we first began walking the earth, humans have been creating lists of one kind or another, calmly content in the knowledge that all Things are constantly being assigned, prioritised, ranked and streamlined to within an inch of their lives. It doesnt bear thinking about, but to live in a world without them would, I reluctantly imagine, be a chaotic existence: not a single to-do list, shopping list, wish list, dictionary, list of favourites, rulebook, list of predictions, list of resolutions, address book, list of advice, list of contents just a world full of things, muddled and overflowing, without a sense of purpose or collective identity. To further explain our reliance on lists, it seems only right to list the reasons: 1.Life is chaotic often unbearably so. The ability to divide some of that chaos into lists, to make the onslaught manageable, can bring much-needed relief. 2.Human beings are fearful of the unknown and as such have a real need to label and group things, to assign them to comfortable lists. 3.Lists can make us more productive and can eradicate procrastination.

Nothing on earth, resignation aside, cuts through the thick fog of a daunting workload as effectively as a to-do list. 4.Everyone is a critic. Ranking things best to worst, biggest to smallest, fastest to slowest can be strangely addictive, no doubt because it makes us feel knowledgeable. 5.Time is precious. Distilling huge swathes of monotonous information into easily digestible lists ensures that we have more time to enjoy ourselves and make lists. The depth of mankinds obsession with lists became starkly apparent to me five years ago, at which point I was delving into various archives, museums and libraries around the world to research my first book, Letters of Note , a collection of notable correspondence from throughout the ages, written by all manner of people.

At almost every juncture of that journey, I was also discovering intriguing lists written by those same characters lists of varying lengths, some handwritten, others typed, most of which captivated me for differing reasons. Five years on and you now hold a gorgeous book that contains 125 of the most compelling lists I have been able to find. A list of lists. They span thousands of years: the oldest is an eye-opening list of workmens absences written in Ancient Egypt; the most recent are merely a few years old. In between we have: a list of murder suspects, scribbled by the long-serving secretary to John F. Kennedy just hours after the presidents assassination; French novelist George Perecs magnificent Attempt at an Inventory of the Liquid and Solid Foodstuffs Ingurgitated by Me in the Course o f the Year Nineteen Hundred and Seventy-Four ; a shopping list written by Galileo that mentions the pieces of equipment he needed to produce his ground-breaking telescope; a list of dream interpretations written around 1220 bc ; a backup list of alternatives to the famous line, Frankly, my dear, I dont give a damn, written shortly after Hollywood censors deemed the word damn to be offensive; and many, many more.

Many of the lists offer advice that you will take to your grave. Some offer a snapshot of history previously unknown. Others are simply a joy to read. Each and every one, however, is certainly a list of note.