Acknowledgments

First off, I’d like to thank the friends and readers who pointed me toward their favorite bits—without you, I would have been in the unenviable position of having to rely exclusively on my own knowledge. Mike Moore deserves special mention for often reminding me of the actual facts of history (quite opposed to what I am wont to believe) and for catching my all-too-frequent typos. I also received enormous technical help from the Nerve gang, especially Isabella, permissions queen, my fabulous assistant, Jessica, and my editors, Genevieve, Susan, and Emily. Thanks also to my editor at Crown, Rachel Kahan, who let me keep many of the nerdy bits, despite the sales team’s admonishments. More than anyone, I have the founders of Nerve, Rufus and Genevieve (again), to thank, not only for letting me get away with the column in the first place, but for tolerating such iconoclastic indulgences as Naughty Pushkin Month and Burn Victim Week. It is a rare privilege for a writer to be able to invent his genre as he goes along; I thank them for having sufficient faith in me to let me loose. One of my advisors in graduate school once told me that you’re only as good as your colleagues; in my years at Nerve, I can only hope that that was true.