Index to “A”

The unusual idea of adding an index to “A” was suggested by CZ in 1976 in anticipation of the first complete publication of poem by the University of California Press (1978). Initially LZ agreed to come up with an index consisting only of the articles “a,” “an” and “the,” but then CZ produced a more thorough and conventional listing of “names & objects,” which LZ then pruned (Scroggins Bio 448-450). The peculiarity of the index and the implication that it contains pointers for reading “A” have often been noted, but so far no one has very convincingly explained the principles determining what is or is not included, much less the eccentricities of LZ’s listings under the three articles.

However, Michael Fournier has compiled a number of intriguing statistical views of the index that he has generously made available and can be viewed at the following links:

Index of Pages Indexed in “A”: a reverse index indicating which items are indexed on each page of the poem

Index Entries Arranged by Frequency of Citation

Frequency of Index Entries in Individual Movements of “A”