A device has occurred to me which goes some little way towards achieving an effect similar to that of the print edition. Each of the twenty-five sections in between those marked First and Last has a symbol presented at its head. The really interested reader is invited to print the contents page (or, if they have been brought up never to defile a webpage, to trace or copy them in some way) and to cut up and therefore separate the twenty-five symbols. They should then place these symbols in a suitable receptacle, shake them vigorously to ensure that they are thoroughly mixed, and then, with the eyes closed, draw them out one after another. The symbols should then be numbered one to twenty-five in the order they came out. The receptacle employed is a matter left to the reader: a hat is traditionally used for such drawing of lots in England, though please understand that I would hope that no headgear of a military character might be employed for so literary a purpose. Many items commonly in domestic use and therefore conveniently to hand suggest themselves: bowls, saucepans, eggboxes, wastebins, cups even; and do not think I would be offended if you selected that childish but oft-still-in-storage piece known in English as a close stool, training toilet, or potty.

But whatever receptacle the reader uses from which to draw their lots, they end up with their very own random order corresponding to the twenty-five sections of the book between First and Last. They now (or after an appropriate interval for refreshment if they are exhausted) proceed to read the First section, and then refer to their cut-out symbols in order to identify the next section in their own order, and read that. And so on, and so on, and so on, and so on, until number twenty-five has been identified and read, whereupon the reader can sigh with relief and read the Last section.

This procedure does, of course, involve a certain amount of clerical and administrative work on the part of the reader. But the amount is surely not excessive, and the lazy reader may of course proceed in their normal manner and accept the webmaster's order. If they do choose not to join in the fun in this way that is, of course, their inalienable right, but they will, however, be missing an experience not commonly (if at all) to be had: and perhaps the point, too. Which is also their inalienable right.

What all online readers cannot help but miss is the physical feel, disintegrative, frail, of this novel in its original format; the tangible metaphor for the random way the mind works.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Webmaster's Notes:

I've put a lot of effort into preserving as much of the original text formatting as is feasible in this copy, in essence wherever not in substance (this mostly referring to the exact length of blank pauses or maintaining the same words on the same lines as in the print version, which would exponentially increase my workload for essentially no difference in effect - poetry, this is not). In keeping with this principle, the spelling of all words is unchanged, including apparent typos (for example, an "s" instead of the article "a" in ✩). It should be mentioned, though, that I am working from the 2008 reprint, and I have no way of knowing which of those mistakes are Johnson's and which are New Directions'.

I have not been able to preserve all of the exact pictographs used for the chapters, as Unicode does not presently appear to contain several of them, though I have attempted to use the closest possible analogues for these (while also not repeating any).

The above is adapted from Johnson's own note in the Hungarian edition of the original run, the publisher for which elected to bind all of the sections together against Johnson's wishes. I would like to clarify that as Webmaster, I am categorically opposed to my webpage being defiled, though I can do little to stop you.