Mr. Wilson's Cabinet Of Wonder: Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology

by Lawrence Weschler

Finalist for Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction
Finalist for National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction

Pronged ants, horned humans, a landscape carved on a fruit pit--some of the displays in David Wilson's Museum of Jurassic Technology are hoaxes. But which ones? As he guides readers through an intellectual hall of mirrors, Lawrence Weschler revisits the 16th-century "wonder cabinets" that were the first museums and compels readers to examine the imaginative origins of both art and science.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Science, Art, Museums, Essays, Nature

171 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1995

About the author

Lawrence Weschler, a graduate of Cowell College of the University of California at Santa Cruz (1974), was for over twenty years (1981-2002) a staff writer at The New Yorker, where his work shuttled between political tragedies and cultural comedies. He is a two-time winner of the George Polk Award (for Cultural Reporting in 1988 and Magazine Reporting in 1992) and was also a recipient of Lannan Literary Award (1998).

His books of political reportage include The Passion of Poland (1984); A Miracle, A Universe: Settling Accounts with Torturers (1990); and Calamities of Exile: Three Nonfiction Novellas (1998).

His “Passions and Wonders” series currently comprises Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees: A Life of Contemporary Artist Robert Irwin (1982); David Hockney’s Cameraworks (1984); Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder (1995); A Wanderer in the Perfect City: Selected Passion Pieces (1998) Boggs: A Comedy of Values (1999); Robert Irwin: Getty Garden (2002); Vermeer in Bosnia (2004); and Everything that Rises: A Book of Convergences (February 2006). Mr. Wilson was shortlisted for both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award; and Everything that Rises received the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award for Criticism.



Recent books include a considerably expanded edition of Seeing is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees, comprising thirty years of conversations with Robert Irwin; a companion volume, True to Life: Twenty Five Years of Conversation with David Hockney; Liza Lou (a monograph out of Rizzoli); Tara Donovan, the catalog for the artist’s recent exhibition at Boston’s Institute for Contemporary Art, and Deborah Butterfield, the catalog for a survey of the artist’s work at the LA Louver Gallery. His latest addition to “Passions and Wonders,” the collection Uncanny Valley: Adventures in the Narrative, came out from Counterpoint in October 2011.

Weschler has taught, variously, at Princeton, Columbia, UCSC, Bard, Vassar, Sarah Lawrence, and NYU, where he is now distinguished writer in residence at the Carter Journalism Institute.

He recently graduated to director emeritus of the New York Institute for the Humanities at NYU, where he has been a fellow since 1991 and was director from 2001-2013, and from which base he had tried to start his own semiannual journal of writing and visual culture, Omnivore. He is also the artistic director emeritus, still actively engaged, with the Chicago Humanities Festival, and curator for New York Live Ideas, an annual body-based humanities collaboration with Bill T. Jones and his NY Live Arts. He is a contributing editor to McSweeney’s, the Threepeeny Review, and The Virginia Quarterly Review; curator at large of the DVD quarterly Wholphin; (recently retired) chair of the Sundance (formerly Soros) Documentary Film Fund; and director of the Ernst Toch Society, dedicated to the promulgation of the music of his grandfather, the noted Weimar emigre composer. He recently launched “Pillow of Air,” a monthly “Amble through the worlds of the visual” column in The Believer.

(from www.lawrenceweschler.com)

Reviews

[Will Byrnes · Rating 4 out of 5]

So, you’re waiting at a bus stop in Culver City when you notice an odd little shop (just, you know, stuck in among the zinnias?) and mosey on in. You could be forgiven if you thought for a moment that you might have dropped into a story from the White Hart or one of Joseph Jorkens’ club yarns. But the tales told here are not tall, at least not the ones told by the author. He tells of this very odd place, The Museum of Jurassic Technology, which holds a dazzling array of oddities, many of which illustrate real science.

The book is divided into two sections, Inhaling the Spore and Cerebral Growth. The first was a 1994 article printed in Harper’s. It begins with a story about a strange parasite, a fungus that infects the Cameroonian stink ant—one of the only ants capable of emitting a vocal sound people can hear, (Learning things like this is one of the reasons we read books like this… and no, the ant doesn’t say “He-elllp me-e-e-e.”),—working its way into the ant’s brain and driving the poor creature to climb up some vegetation and then clamp its jaws so tightly onto a leaf that it becomes locked in place. The fungus proceeds to take over the remaining brain and then sends a stalk up from the ant’s head. The fungal stalk grows until, having reached full maturity, it bursts and spews a cloud of spores to stalk the next generation of ants. It is no stretch to infer that Wechsler was himself so infected the first day he wandered into owner/curator David Wilson’s treasure trove. While no fungal spikes appear to have emerged from the author’s cranium, he was indeed infected with a growing curiousity about the materials he had seen. Wechsler tracks down the veracity of some of these. It almost does not matter whether any are reality-based. Some are, of course. Some not so much.

In Part 2, Cerebral Growth, the author looks at the beginnings of museums, the so-called “wonder cabinets” of the 15th and 16th and 17th centuries, eclectic collections of samples from nature and art that sometimes filled entire rooms. Francis Bacon urged collectors to prepare:

“a goodly, huge cabinet, wherein whatsoever the hand of man by exquisite art or engine has made rare in stuff, form or motion; whatsoever singularity, chance and the shuffle of things hath produced; whatsoever Nature has wrought in things that want life and may be kept; shall be sorted and included.”

These Wunderkammern of yore constituted the birthplace of museums, which now tend to be public rather than private, and split between nature and art. The overall sense of wonder that infused these collections is what made them special, and what makes us special in our appreciation of the stimulating, new and surprising. The MJT is a throwback, including not only scientific exhibitions, but displays of intricate scenes carved into plum pits and microminiature sculptures on “motes of dust, specks of lint, and wisps of hair.” And of course, an actual human horn. (Thus the cute section title) The sort of material that, eliciting from us our natural sense of wonder, makes us stand, stare (or sit, read) and say “cool.”

Almost constituting a third section, an extensive, 40-page list of notes is also filled with interesting tidbits.

To come across an unsuspected gem like this is truly a joy. Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder was a Pulitzer finalist in 1996. That it did not win is understandable, given its very modest length. But that it was nominated is, well, wonderful.

The museum is very much a going concern. You can visit at http://www.mjt.org/. The museum’s soul, David Hildebrand Wilson, received a MacArthur genius grant in 2001.

PS - One of my favorite quotes from the book:

P 145

“Many ancient peoples believed that strength and fertility were concentrated in horns,” [Martin] Montestier [in the book Human Oddities] points out, “hence the numerous cults worshiping bulls and rams…Jupiter, the supreme Roman god, was depicted with horns, as was Isis, the Egyptian goddess of fertility [definitely not cherry Isis]. When Alexander the Great declared himself the son of Jupiter [or, actually, of Zeus], he ordered that all coins bearing his likeness should henceforth show him with horns. Moses was sometimes depicted with horns as was Christ Himself. Many rulers had horns affixed to their helmets as a symbol of power.”

UPDATE

7/31/11 - I came across a small bit of the taste of the times (late 17th, early 18th centuries) in The Clockwork Universe. Gottfried Leibniz, the other creator of calculus, and overall unbelievable genius (p 237) drew up detailed plans for a “museum of everything that could be imagined,” roughly a cross between a science exhibition and a Ripley’s Believe it or Not museum. It would feature clowns and fireworks, races between mechanical horses, rope dancers, fire eaters, musical instruments that played themselves, gambling halls (to bring in money), inventions, an anatomical theater, transfusions, telescopes, demonstrations of how the human voice could shatter a drinking glass or how light reflected from a mirror could ignite a fire.

[Forrest · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somewhere between a Sotheby's catalog and a bizarre issue of McSweeney's, Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder is . . . well, a cabinet of wonder. If Devo, They Might Be Giants, and Talking Heads all ate way too much turkey, then had a collective dream set in a museum, this is the book they'd write. It's one of those great books where the line between fiction and non-fiction is blurred, both by auctorial intent and by the subject matter itself. This is a deliciously misleading book, full of subterfuge and teasings, a shadow play of fact and fiction mixing popular culture, philosophy, the history of science, and a touch of political intrigue. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what kind of writing this is. Is it journalism? Is it fiction? Is it creative non-fiction? Do I really care? This is unabashed writing; indulgent, with moments of brilliance. Alas, it was all over too soon. All the more reason to go visit the subject of the book, The Museum of Jurassic Technology, the next time I'm out California way (which is every couple of years, since The Parents live out there). If you can't visit the museum itself (I have yet to do so myself, but will be remedying that), put on a beanie cap, play some Devo, eat as much turkey as you can handle, and read this book through a kaleidoscope while reciting aloud Pliny the Elder, Charles Darwin, and Hunter S. Thompson as if rewritten by Terry Gilliam and . . . well, you get the idea. Or not. It doesn't really matter, does it? Speaking of not mattering, are you aware that you can buy a Devo action figure? No, really!

[El · Rating 2 out of 5]

One of my favorite museums in the US is The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland. One of the reasons for that is they have this Chamber of Wonders which includes arms and armor (boo, hiss, no one cares) and this one room that's filled with all these marvelous and strange... things. And it's this room that I just adore to pieces and could spend hours in just because.

Also there's this painting, The Archdukes Albert and Isabella Visiting a Collector's Cabinet (1621-23) that I can stare at forever too, because there's so much happening in this painting.

Hi. Nerd.

I also liked that book, A Cabinet of Medical Curiosities because, well, I'm interested in medical curiosities as well as worldly curiosities.

My point is, I enjoy learning about these sorts of things. I find it fascinating. There are things in the world that we're so desensitized to, but think about the first time someone saw some of these things. I don't know how more people didn't just have heart attacks on the spot, because just tonight I thought I saw some unusual little critter scurry under the porch, and you would have thought I just discovered the first land-based Loch Ness Monster. And it was probably just a fucking chipmunk.

I went into reading this book thinking I would feel like I feel when I walk into that room at the Walters - full of wonder and excitement, even though I know everything in that room because I visit it every time I am in Baltimore now. Meh. I didn't get that feeling during this reading.

The author writes about the Museum of Jurassic Technology in Los Angeles. Basically it sounds like a full-size version of the one room I love in the Walters. No doubt I would piss myself senseless if I could spend time in the MJT in person, but reading about Weschler's experiences with discovering it and his thoughts on things was way less exciting than I wanted.

The back cover says "...Weschler gives us a work of nonfiction that is as allusive, as dizzying, and as urbanely astonishing as anything by Borges or Calvino." The back cover also calls this Literature/Natural Science. So I probably missed the point entirely. It was interesting, but not that dizzying, and I don't like that sort of thing in my nonfiction anyway. I read fiction to be dizzied. I read nonfiction to learn things. Don't fuck with my head while I'm reading nonfiction. I know this will work for a lot of people; it was probably not at all the right time for me to read this one, and so it did not necessarily work for me.

I did learn about this museum from this book, which I now want to visit the hell out of because come on.

In any case, I had no desire to ever visit Los Angeles, but now Weschler has given me a reason to maybe-possibly want to go. Just to visit the MJT.

More importantly, I really want to go back to the Walters and sit in my favorite chamber for an hour or two.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a mind-bomb of a book. It starts out very small (160 pages, including generous footnotes), but somewhere in the reading, it pops open inside your head, like a popcorn kernel, with a loud "PTHUNK!" And suddenly, large swaths of your brain-space are being employed to process the implications of this strange, little-known museum out in west Los Angeles.

The Museum of Jurassic Technology, if you're not familiar, is curated and owned by Mr. David Wilson. It's operated at a net loss for years, its owners always just on this side of bankruptcy. It is unassuming from the outside -- many first-time visitors stop in for something to do while waiting for a bus at the corner -- but once inside, you're brought into a world completely removed from our own. Mr. Wilson has an exhibit that features African stink ants that have been made into crazed zombies by a tree spore which causes them to climb up blades of grass and die while the spore creates a horn-like appendage from their forehead, aimed at dropping more spores on more ants. There's also a sculpture of Pope John Paul II made out of a wad of hair, so small that it can fit into the eye of a needle; a peach pit with a Medieval fresco carved into it; a horn that was supposedly grown from a woman's head; and an exhibit called "Tell the Bees" that was so complicated in its evolutionary implications, I don't think I can do it justice here.

The author, Lawrence Weschler, assumes most of this stuff is fake, and starts to research some of the more outlandish claims. Shockingly, he finds out that more of it than not is real. The boundaries between fabricated elements and pieces of truly forgotten science and art (microminiatures, it seems, were quite popular forms of art in the 16th century) gets very fuzzy indeed as we learn more about the mysterious Mr. Wilson, a former experimental filmmaker who had a religious conversion in his teens that brought him to this endeavor. If his literature features some fake addresses of "affiliate" publications, it doesn't discredit the fact that people really did grow horns in the olden days (it was a type of cyst that today can be handled with minimal cost or effort that in its day was strangely common and untreatable, even in the upper classes) or that these types of "curiosity museums" were de rigueur among high society, that a man of letters was all but required to have a room for his guests that housed rare animals, great art, strange inventions, and religious artifacts meant only to reignite his guests' sense of wonder. The deeper Weschler digs, the stranger it all gets, and the harder it is to discern fake from truth, superstition from verifiable science.

And that's the point. As we delve into the increasingly convoluted footnotes, we find that the line separating scientific analysis from religious faith and alchemical crackpottery is often hair-thin. The first forms of scientific rigor came out of a religious fervor to understand God's creation better, and the only thing that separated them from medieval alchemy was improved methodology and results. As Weschler notes (from a speech by John Maynard Keynes, of all people), Newton wasn't just the first scientist; he was the last alchemist. His early work, largely forgotten or intentionally ignored, is full of lead-into-gold schemes and other black magic of the time. He was carried along by the Renaissance's notion of scientific rigor and is remembered mostly because he had a steep and impressive learning curve.

By the time you're this far into the maze, you begin to forget that this was supposed to be a breezy little book about strange roadside museums and has now grown to encompass the very cornerstones of scientific thought and their mutual dependence on the pre-Enlightenment insistence on open-eyed Wonder, a gawking at the complexity of nature and all its variants and an insistence that much forward progress in human thought was fueled by simply gazing at spore-maddened ants, human horns, and microscopically brilliant works of human art. This book will take you as deep as you want to go and open up portions of history that seem, on the surface, to be built of nothing but boils and witchcraft and short lifespans. Despite its short length, it's a book that you almost can't absorb in one read -- you'll want to peer deeply into these cabinets of curiosities, maybe visit the museum itself (it's still open 20 years after this book was written), and then re-enter the book from the start, hoping to keep the threads of inquiry from criss-crossing into an impossible knot. Very, very highly recommended.

[Ana Cristina Lee]

Abandono, no sé qué estoy leyendo. Y mira que el tema me interesaba, los museos viejunos y tal, pero de la manera en que está escrito, es que no me entero y no sé si el esfuerzo merece la pena...

[Ken · Rating 3 out of 5]

MR.WILSON'S CABINET OF WONDER is categorized by Vintage Press as
"Literature / Natural Science."

LITERATURE ? Hardly. Some references to writers of some note like
Shakespeare, Dante, Ovid . That's it.

NATURAL SCIENCE ? Maybe. Closer to oddities and scientific anomalies :
Keratin growth on the human skull reminiscent of animal horns.
A tropical ant controlled and used by a fungus to propagate itself.
Collected kidney stones in floral arrangements with human baby skeletons.

TECHNOLOGY ? Yes : incredibly detailed miniaturizations, lens
manipulation, queer surgical instruments.

FOLK TRADITIONS / CURES ? Feeding a cooked mouse, fur and all ,on toast,
to a child to cure bed-wetting. No, not kidding .
And more.

Overall, Mr. Weschler offers a dry, clinical treatise on the Wunderkammern,
or cabinet of curiosities, fashionable in Europe during the age of exploration.
People could not get enough of the mysteries of the world, revealed often
through unexplained objects brought home by sailors and adventurers.
Weschler made frequent trips to, and slowly developed a friendship with
the curator of The Museum of Jurassic Technology in California . The
museum, an expansion of that very concept of a collection, is the subject
of this book.

The laid back unfortunately gives way to arcane reference material. Page
after page of book titles, page numbers and obscure foreign names divert
the reader from one massive footnote to another. With more notes in a
separate section at the end, thank you very much. While a cool-sounding
concept with some interesting sketches and diagrams, the book rambles
on, having lost its direction somewhere in the poorly lit halls of that
dusty museum.

The silver medallion on the front cover proudly proclaims "FINALIST"
for both The National Book Critics Circle Award and The Pulitzer.
Spoiler : Got neither.

Read it if you wish. See why.

[Viola · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pirms radās muzeji mūsdienu izpratnē, daudzās Eiropas pilsētās radās tā sauktās Kunstkameras vai Ziņkārības kabineti, kuros tika apkopoti interesanti un biedējoši eksponāti no visas pasaules, turklāt bez īpašas šķirošanas - Amazones indiāņu bultas, cālis ar 4 kājam vai spirtā peldošas dažādas ķermeņa daļas.

[trovateOrtensia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Carino
(mi sto allenando alla sintesi)

[Maureen · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is only one word to describe this book: peculiar. David Wilson, who set up a museum of oddities and curiosities in a storefront in East L.A., is a peculiar man whose interests run from the eclectic to the confabulatory. Some of the most outrageous exhibits turn out to be real, while others, perhaps slightly muted in their presentation, are more constructs of theories of how things might have been. I couldn't help but to think of the family heirloom, passed down from generation to generation, with the story of how Betty Sue brought it West in the covered wagon. Ms. Current Owner takes it to the Antiques Roadshow, and finds out that her priceless Revolutionary War saber is actually a post-Civil War pig sticker. History is written by the victor, and the museum is curated by the last person in line in a children's game of telephone. I'm not saying descriptions on objects in museums are not accurate, just that since reading this book, I enter their front doors in a whole 'nother frame of mind.

Mr. Wilson won a McArthur Fellowship, a.k.a. Genius Grant, in 1991.

[Xan Shadowflutter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Have you ever wondered if that museum exhibit you are looking at so intently is fake? No, of course not. It's a museum. Well, perhaps a second look is warranted when the exhibit is found in Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder. Many of his exhibits are factual, but every so often he sneaks in a fake one, and it is your job to figure out which are the fakes.

Little did I know there is an entire museum subculture out there that specializes in mixing fake exhibits with real ones. Some curators like to mess with your mind, I guess. Unfortunately, I found the book to be bloated and, at times, boring. Bloated because it is really a magazine article trying to be a book, and boring because it is bloated. Don't turn magazine articles into books! You can finish this in a day if you are so inclined. The whole subculture thing is interesting. Mr. Wilson is interesting.

[Joachim Stoop · Rating 2 out of 5]

While this should've been right up my Borgesian alley I never really found an entrance. It suffocated me more than it intrigued me.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

I discovered this little gem amongst the unique and varied volumes for sale at Viktor Wynd's Little Shop of Horrors in London and, just like the shop I found it in, I loved it and was utterly confused by it (in an immensely good way). Upon reading this book you quickly discover that you don't know what is fact and what is fiction, and of course what is a little bit of both. Weschler takes us into the world of the Museum of Jurassic Technology (MJT) where he allows us to lose ourselves in the displays and fictional facts and exhibits brought together by the mysterious Mr Wilson over his years of dedication to those objects largely ignored by the more 'mainstream' establishments. In doing so we find ourselves on a journey through the history of collecting and museums, from their origins as the wonder cabinets of old to the isolated and segregated institutions we have today. The language is enchanting and engaging and creates a wonderful story, weaving fact and fiction and all the possibilities in between together so you are left not really knowing what to believe and thus believing everything. The only drawback is that it is over all too soon (and I don't live anywhere near the MJT so can only get my fix by re-reading this marvellous work).

[Judson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Next time you visit LA, here is what I'm demanding that you do:

1. Go to the Museum of Jurassic Technology
2. Eat a few doors away at India Sweets & Spices
3. Read this book

The time after that that you visit LA, you will want to:

1. Go to the Museum of Jurassic Technology
2. Stay at the Museum of Jurassic Technology twice as long as you did the first time
3. Eat a few doors away at India Sweets & Spices
4. Read a book anywhere near as good as Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder

It's a book about the strangest museum I've ever been to and it's a book about the history of Western cultural wonder. If I were forced at gunpoint to deduct one star, it would be because I already knew about the fungus that possesses certain ants, but then the Internet is to blame for that.

[Kathryn · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this in grad school and have since read it many times, as I teach it to my students.

This is about the Museum of Jurassic Technology in Culver City (just down the street from us) -- a museum that may (or may not) be filled with fictional exhibits -- things like a human horn, ants that inhale a spore that makes them crazy, and a scientist studying a theory of memory based on forgetting.

Weschler does an amazing job of describing his sense of wonder on discovering the museum, meeting its creator, and trying to figure out just what in the world was going on there. He manages to weave in confusion and confusion about confusion until we have no idea what is and what isn't the truth -- but can appreciate the place between knowing and not knowing.

Genius!

[Eddie Watkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I only give this book 5 stars because it introduced me to the museum itself, which I managed to visit a few years ago and which will remain one of my most cherished spaces.

After rereading (or rather flitting through) the book after visiting the museum I found it kind of annoying, maybe a little condescending, but I still liked the point Weschler made somewhere in the book that the purpose of the museum is to induce a sense of wonder.

[Lahierbaroja · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yo no entiendo nada. No sé qué interés puede tener leer este libro si no es más que un folleto de un museo un poco más largo, algo que habría funcionado mejor en forma de podcast.

Literariamente no tiene ninguna novedad, el contenido se hace aburrido y repetitivo y las cosas que nos cuentan (quitando los objetos del propio museo), todo eso de que hay que ser curioso, es algo tan básico que no necesito que alguien lo diga.

No entiendo nada pero está claro que algo se me escapa, ya que consideraron esta obra como finalista del Pulitzer, ahí es nada.

https://lahierbaroja.com/2023/03/14/e...

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a strange, little, occasionally delightful book inspired by Lawrence Weschler's fascination with the Museum of Jurassic Technology, an offbeat cultural attraction here in Los Angeles. I have never actually visited the museum but have heard it frequently mentioned, which is impressive considering the museum makes virtually no effort to promote itself, charges a nominal "suggested donation" fee for entrance, and operates out of a relatively tiny (compared to your average museum) storefront on Venice Blvd.

Owned and operated by a man named David Wilson (the "Mr. Wilson" of the book's title, naturally), the MJT is a true work of art, in that it was designed purely as the manifestation of an artistic vision, and continues to function as such to this day, uncorrupted by financial or corporate interests of any kind. It's also quirky as hell and sounds like a lot of fun to visit.

I learned all this from reading Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder, which was conceived as a sort of museum in book form. While entertaining and interesting to behold, the MJT's exhibits also serve as a commentary on the very thing they represent: museum exhibits. David Wilson reinvents history to suit his needs, concocting entire installations around false premises, then injecting real information amidst the fake to make the viewer scratch their heads and wonder what the hell is going on. His work inspired Weschler to think about the entire museum movement as a whole, the ways in which they select information and artifacts, shaping our view of the represented subject, and sometimes shaping history and/or the subject itself.

The resulting book begins with an exploration of the Museum of Jurassic Technology then continues into an exploration of the greater museum movement, how museums first began and how they have evolved throughout time. When Weschler is documenting his own experience, his impressions of the MJT and of Wilson and and of other museum-type stuff, Mr. Wilson's Cabinet is a wonderful read, brimming with wry observations and interesting ruminations. When Weschler deviates into historical realms, wheeling through ancient texts, collections, and long-dead personages, the writing gets a little dry. Frequent footnotes are intended, I believe, to represent the literary experience of actually visiting a museum, providing a sort of info-placard to the verbal "installation" your eyes are reading. But the footnotes get annoying after a while, especially when their length begins to grow exponentially without adding much to the chapter they appear in.

I imagine Weschler was surprised to even get this thing published as a book, let alone nominated for both the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for general nonfiction. It is certainly well-written, and Weschler's ability to synthesize reams of research into a cohesive, and extremely concise, historical narrative is impressive. But the scope of this work is extremely limited, and to me, not very ambitious. It feels like a lark, like a little side-project Weschler embarked on, perhaps to pitch as an article to the New Yorker. I'm glad it exists, and for those who really dig museums it's a must-read, but I think its consideration for the most prestigious prizes in literature might have been a little much...

[Kay · Rating 4 out of 5]

The suspension of disbelief is a marvelous thing. This rumination/examination of a singular museum and its eccentric curator looks at the boundaries of what's real and what's imaginary. If, like me, you're continually stunned by the things that people believe and accept without question (especially when presented in a convincing manner, or as my mother-in-law once said, "I know it's true -- I read it in the newspaper!" and she was referring to the National Enquirer), then this tour through a modern-day "cabinet of wonders" will prove fascinating. It's really an exploration of what people will believe, want to believe, or perhaps need to believe. It's also the story of one man's personal odyssey to construct an alternate reality. Or perhaps he merely set out to construct elaborate hoaxes. Either way, it's a book that fulfills its title's promise of being about "wonder."

[Ed Erwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Museum of Jurassic Technology is a fascinating place that for the right person will fill you with a sense of wonder. Different exhibits make you wonder in different ways, from "Is this real?" to "How is that possible?" to "Why is this in a museum?" or "Is this even a museum?". Intentionally or not, this is probably the most 'Pataphysical place I've ever been to. (A close second would be the sort of "side-show" that once accompanied performances by the bands Idiot Flesh and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum.)

This book expands on an article that was originally published in Harper's magazine. There is also a DVD version called "Inhaling the Spore" which greatly overlaps with this, but also has some different content.

The museum itself deserved all the stars in the world. This book, slightly fewer than that.

[Kit Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fun and light and informative; to be read by one and all all the time always. The story of the museum itself is pretty intriguing, but the author's approach—and his dips into the history of museum oddities itself—is what really makes this memorable. Weschler was just the right visitor to Wilson's curio cabinet; in the hands of a lesser writer, this would have come off as twee or "it's funny because he's ironically un-ironic about all these odd knickknacks...which makes it both funny and not at the same time...or something."

[David · Rating 1 out of 5]

Overly pretentious and cutesy, this book reminded me of a cross between the odd homespun wisdom dished out in the Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle books and an old version of Ripley’s Believe it or Not! (the library bound version from the 50s with the orange fabric cover and the peculiar drawings).

The beginning and the premise were fine but once part II (Cerebral Growth) rolled around the writing broke down into very, very long run-on sentences with strange references that quickly caused me to lose interest.

This is a love-it-or-hate-it kind of book and I hated it.

[Lucas · Rating 3 out of 5]

A detailed account of the Museum Of Jurassic Technology's origins and likely influences, cannily cross-referenced and researched, but ultimately reported by someone who I wouldn't actually enjoy visiting the museum with. By the end I had to wonder if the fastidiousness of the history was an overcompensation for a lack of imagination.

[Lois · Rating 3 out of 5]

Weschler takes us to a small natural history museum "with an emphasis on curiosities and technological innovation". I didn't know what to make of the various exhibitions or even whether I wanted to make anything of them. But reading along I gathered that even the most discerning reader was not supposed to be able to sort all the hoaxes from the actual wonders. I noted the tricks in the language: "at times stupefyingly specific, at other times maddeningly vague" and understood that social media and political-speak are not unique in that "truth and lie are embedded in the same statement." I had been hoping for more curiosities, but what is presented here is a sampling which should enable you to track the emergence of systematic science from earlier observations of natural history and the collections of curiosities in "wonder cabinets". This is a short, odd read which would be enjoyed by a limited audience.

[Tessa D · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an interesting and whacky unexpected adventure! Thanks to David Bowie's 100 Book Reads I stumbled upon this unique gem. As someone who loves to have their mind blown this particularly blasted me with all my favorite elements: history, quirky characters, museums, cool and unusual things, and the grand curiosity. A perfect mix of the known, the unknown, and the strangeness in-between. Informative and delightful. I feel weirder having read it, and I like that.

[Lilly Thies · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was confusing but also necessarily so I think. Big into the wunderkammer lately

[Judy · Rating 3 out of 5]

An odd little book. Quirky. While I was reading, two words kept coming to mind: arcane and erudite. Now neither of the words are ones that I use on a daily basis, so I checked the definitions in a dictionary.

arcane: understood by few, mysterious or secret
erudite: showing great knowledge or learning

They both fit this book. I was expecting to learn about a man's cabinet of natural 'oddities,' or at least what seemed odd to some collector at some time. Actually, this is more of a brief history of the earliest museums (collections of oddities).

Mr. Wilson's 'cabinet' is a museum in west Los Angeles, the Museum of Jurassic Technology. On p 74, Weschler comments on the contents of the collection:

The tension between what is real and imaginary is a source of aesthetic tension as well as its subversive implications.

I didn't enjoy reading this; I prefer more straight-forward writing. That said, I'm including a favorite passage from p 103:

The recording was now explaining the title of the show, which drew on funeral practices dating back to Hellenistic Greece, when bees were understood to be 'the muse's bird' and hence needed to be apprised of all major family events. There were elaborate rituals involving youngsters and beehives ...
This brought to mind the children's book, Linnets and Valerians by Elizabeth Goudge.

The paragraph continues, "Among those who know them well, bees are understood to be quiet and sober beings that disapprove of lying, cheating, and menstruous women. Bees do not thrive in a quarrelsome family, dislike bad language, and should never be bought or sold.
So bees dislike 'menstruous women.' (That put a smile on my face.)

I'm not keeping this book.

[Michael Titus · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the very few books I purchased by merely looking at the cover and title. I've always had a fascination with Wunderkammern, the precursor of the modern day museum. I love museums and this book recounts the remarkable history of their development, from the 16th Century to what we
are aware of today. But the most intriguing thing, to me, about this book is the introduction and investigation of one David Wilson, the accordion-playing proprietor of The Museum of Jurassic Technology in LA.

The enigmatic Mr. Wilson seems to be, at first, a shadow in his own storefront (which author Lawrence Weschler discovers by accident); appearing and suddenly somewhere else, even outside serenading pedestrians with accordion. Wilson give rather vague, cryptic answers to Weschler's questions about what the MJT really is. Wilson is playful, but knowledgeable. The reader is introduced to exhibits that might we real - or should be. It's a delightful journey from beginning to end. After you put the book down, the only thing you are sure of is how little you are sure of anything but the wonder of this world.

[Neil McCrea · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is both wondrous and edifying. I recommend reading it at a moderate pace over the course of three days for best results in stimulating both your imaginative and rational faculties.

This is a short book about the Museum of Jurassic Technology, a queer storefront museum in LA that blurs the categories of natural history, art and technology museums. The displays at the museum are crafted to instill a sense of both wonder and disbelief. Most of the exhibits are authentic if exceedingly unusual, but amongst them are an assortment of Barnum-esque humbug. Except, even the humbug has provenance, a history, an appeal to authority that at one point claimed such a thing were true. It is as if Borges and Eco got together to endow a museum. The book continues on in a meandering way, not dissimilar to the setup of the museum, to give a biography of David Wilson, the museum's founder, and it eventually becomes a brief history of the very idea of museums. Delightful.

Fiction Files note: Ben Loory either works for or possibly lives in this museum. That statement is no doubt untrue, but it SHOULD be true.

[Kristal · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you happen to be in downtown Culver City, you might notice a small nondescript store with the name Museum of Jurassic Technology. It is overflowing with wonders such as the Megaloponera foetens (the Cameroonian stink ant), the Sonnabend Model of Obliscence, and a small diorama of an urn surrounded by French (or Flemish?) moths. Not to worry, each article has a wonderfully descriptive and embellished narrative to explain to the common folk about the piece. If you are still confused, just read one of the pamphlets, proved by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Information.

And just to prove my point, here is a wonderful quote from the book: 'the visitor to the Museum of Jurassic Technology continually finds himself shimmering between wondering at the marvels of nature and wondering whether any of this could possibly be true. And it's that very shimmer, the capacity for such delicious confusion, (David) Wilson sometimes seems to suggest, that may constitute the most blessedly wonder thing about being human.'

[Noah · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quirky little book about one of my favorite quirky places in the world: The Museum of Jurassic Technology. If you've never been to or heard of the place, this book is a great primer for the wonderful and bizarre experiences within. The book is really just two long essays, one about the eponymous Mr. Wilson who is as odd as the items he has on display in the museum he created, and the other a brief history of Cabinets of Curisoities (AKA Wunderkammer) that are the precursor to modern museums (and also the MJT). Weschler comes to both with a sense of intrigue and humor; and while he leaves as many questions unanswered as answered, it's a fun journey to go on with him.