A Pickle for the Knowing Ones

About the book

Timothy Dexter's brief writings combine personal boasts, grievances, commercial recollections, political opinions, and declarations of his own importance. Their irregular spelling and extraordinary handling of punctuation are inseparable from the voice: the author treats readers as people who ought to recognize his success even when they question his literary methods. This edition surrounds the text with an introductory account of Dexter's career, house, public displays, and relationship with his self-appointed poet. It also preserves the famous response to complaints about missing punctuation by supplying marks for readers to distribute themselves. The book is both an exercise in determined self-presentation and a record of the way an eccentric local celebrity was packaged for later curiosity.

• Self-invention
• Wealth and recognition
• Unconventional language

Why read it

Encounter a distinctive American voice whose typography, vanity, and refusal of convention form part of the reading experience.

English fourth edition, 1848, with introductory preface