After many years as an entertainment journalist, A J Jacobs became increasingly concerned at the massive and humiliating gaps in his general knowledge - plenty on Britney, Eminem and Catherine Zeta Jones, but scarily little on Beethoven, Einstein or Goethe. Many of us feel that way as college becomes ever more distant, but Jacobs' unique response was to set for himself a suitably daunting, and some might say insane, task: to fill the holes in his education by reading the Encyclopaedia Britannica. All of it. From beginning to end . . .
Operation Encyclopaedia tests the outer limits of Jacobs's stamina, illuminates the value of wisdom over facts, and explores the real meaning of intelligence, as he endeavours to join Mensa, get onto Who Wants to be a Millionaire? and absorb - and try to remember - 33,000 pages of information and learning. On his journey, Jacobs discovers some of the strangest, funniest, and most profound facts about every topic under the sun, all while battling fatigue, the ridicule of friends and family, and the paralysing fear that attends his first real-life responsibility - the birth of his first child.
Jacobs's singular feat naturally calls for some heavy intellectual lifting on his part - the entire Britannica set weighs in at a total of 9 stone. For the reader, however, 'The Know-It-All' is part an assemblage of fascinating trivia, part hilarious journey.
