QUILLBLOG

Not so trivial

Today, the New York Times profiles Ben Schott, British collector of miscellany and author of the soon-to-be-published Schott’s Almanac 2007. Although the almanac includes information both trivial and significant about the past year, Schott makes a distinction between the sort of facts he collects and mere garden variety trivia:

“I hate trivia,” he said, “and I’ve never been interested in trivia books. Trivia is competitive; it’s ‘I know this and you don’t.’ I think what I’m doing is more inclusive. It’s more about sharing information. So it’s not so much about, say, who won the Super Bowl in such and such a year as what’s engraved on the Super Bowl trophy. Trivia books are written by people who are obsessed, and I wouldn’t want to read any of them.”

The only thing Schott could be accused of being obsessed with is classic book design: “Mr. Schott does all the typesetting himself and tries to make every paragraph end flush right.” He also tells the Times, “There’s real metaphorical joy in juxtaposition. I think it’s quite funny to talk about Paris Hilton, for example, in the same typeface that Ben Franklin might have used.”

Related links:
Click here for the Times profile

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