Norman Mailer: Works and Days

The Joy of Bricks

New Yorker, 4 May 1998, 96-103 (98.5)

Norman Mailers Lego city a futuristic MontSaintMichel which sits in his living room.

Take a brick. Look at it. Is it plastic? Does it have eight knobs on top and three tubular holes underneath? Is it, would you say, molded to a tolerance of five-thousandths of a millimetre? If so, you are probably holding a piece of Lego. If you’re still not sure, gather five more bricks of the same design and start clicking them together. Take your time. If you discover that there are a hundred and two million nine hundred and eighty-one thousand five hundred ways in which those six pieces of plastic can possibly be combined, then Lego it is.

[ excerpt ends ]

Work: The Joy of Bricks
Source: New Yorker, 4 May 1998, 96-103 (98.5)
Rights: REQUEST-NEEDED
Last updated: 2026-06-06