Remember zines? Before there was McSweeneys, before "A Staggering Work of Hearbreaking Genius," before The Believer, and so many other Dave Eggers projects, there was Might magazine, which could be found in certain obscure zine shops in the East Village (at least, that's where I found it). I still have most of the full run of Might in a box somewhere, but this 1998 paperback collects the best of its snarky Spy Lite vision. Eggers, the editor, was such an unknown at that point that his name appears nowhere on the cover, though there is an essay in here by him about the F word. Getting top billing is an essay by David Foster Wallace that I had completely forgotten until I just looked closely at this for the first time in a dozen years: "Hail the Returning Dragon, Clothed in New Fire," which tries to look on the bright side of AIDS. Yes, really. Also in here: Ted Rall's "College Is for Suckers." A piece by R.U. Sirius and another by the frontman for Soul Coughing, a band I barely remember. It's a strange little time capsule from the eve of the Internet age.

Th is Old Book started as a Tumblr, which is also archived on Palafo.com. These are books that have survived many purges from my shelves over decades, with a few comments attempting to figure out why I have held onto them.

Once upon a time, a bunch of writers and editors who found themselves working quite by accident for newspapers in a small town in Pennsylvania decided to have a party. A 20-something native of the town found himself among them, and as he listened to the conversation, about the news of the day, and books, and movies, and politics, and culture, his face grew more and more pinched, until finally he confided in the woman who had invited him, "Your friends sure do know a lot of words." Wherever he is now, I am sure he knows a few more words, but sometimes I recognize the sentiment. Most recently I experienced a similar befuddlement after slogging through 114 pages of the book I am supposedly reading, "Anathem," by the uber-nerd Neal Stephenson.

The last time I had to read with a dictionary this close to me was when I made my way through "Infinite Jest" by David Foster Wallace, may he rest in peace. Wallace never misused a word, though -- and I am not sure I can say that for Neal Stephenson -- nor did he often coin them, though he rescued many from obscurity and put them to new use.

Stephenson's work is, at least on the surface, a work of science fiction, set in an alternate world, where words do not quite mean what they mean to us, and where many words have been invented. Now, I remember loving Frank Herbert's "Dune," and I learned to write in Elvish during my teenage "Lord of the Rings" period (no tattoos, though). Heck, I read the "Silmarillion"! And the ever-more baroque works of Pynchon. Maybe I just don't have the patience for this sort of thing anymore.

Here are some examples from my exasperated notes:

extramuros chronochasm oculus analemma aut avout chancel concent fraa nave orrery praxis sline surr theoric

...and the book's title, which I misread as "anthem" for quite a while (a word that it echoes, and of course the title of a popular book by the awful hack Ayn Rand, spiritual adviser to fed chairman Alan Greenspan, which is neither here nor there, except when I look at my dwindling portfolio. I always knew her claptrap was bad news).

Now, it helps that Stephenson's book has a glossary, something I only noticed after resorting to the Web, where the Anathem Wikia proved to be of some help. And, admittedly, I am starting to get into a groove, as fans of the books claims will happen after the first 100 pages or so. We shall see. I am willing to give him a chance, since I was a fan of his early works, though I was unable to wade through his mammoth trilogy about the history of physics, or whatever it was about. (My friend Andy says I should give it another chance.)

Stephenson doesn't make it easy. Many of the chapters of "Anathem" are preceded by helpful dictionary entries, along the lines of this:

Provener -- The primary daily aut of a concent, Provener is celebrated by the avout just before the mid-day meal. Main features are a lesson, recapitulating some theoric achievement in history, and the winding of the Great Clock.

It's enough to make you sit down on an analemma and weep.

At least one coinage appears to need no explanation: bulshytte. Stephenson -- eschewing the footnote-endnote-happy style of DFW -- might argue that the term is slightly different from our earthbound one. He promises to discuss more about the ideas that inspired the book at his Web site. I haven't clicked there yet. I'm still working on the book.

This could take a while. (Note: I did eventually finish it and wrote a longer post.)