House of Leaves/Fridge

• Fridge Brilliance: The book itself. Most editions have the cover being just slightly too narrow to fully cover the pages. In other words: the book is bigger on the inside.
  • In fact, due to Johnny spilling ink on some 40 pages of Zampano's manuscript and being forced to omit them, the complete book would be longer than the one you are reading.
  • Not to mention that when Navidson reads House of Leaves at the end, he says that the book is 736 pages long. The hardcover is only 709 pages.
    • He's already read 26. Take that as you will.
    • Actually, the total page count (in the paperback full-colour edition anyway) is 736, when one includes a page of reviews, the title page, the copyright information, the contents page, the foreword, Johnny's introduction and the other side of the "Yggdrasil" poem. Yes, Danielewski is that good.
  • Over-filled and spilling things are a theme through the book. Navy puts too much coffee on his cup, too.
• And there's this exchange, which is more like Fridge Irony. Really, really painful irony:

Tom: At least when you're drunk, you've always got the floor for your best friend. Know why?
Navy: It's always there for you.

• At one point, the editors mention that they are not sure who originally put in the bizzare formatting. It is very similar to the formatting Johnny's mother's letters had, which suggests it was Johnny that put in that formatting.
• In my first reading of House of Leaves, I was bewildered and irritated by some of the text-formatting foolishness. On a second reading, I realized that each case was showing the mental state of the main characters of that chapter. In a chapter comparing Will and Tom Navidson to Jacob and Esau, the text was arranged into two columns per page (regarding two pairs of brothers). In Holloway's Exploration #4, footnotes containing long and meaningless lists gradually take up more and more of the pages, going along with Holloway's growing insanity and claustrophobia. In Navidson's explorations of the labyrinth the text is arranged into a few lines per page with the rest blank, giving a sense of openness, purpose, and clarity. - Neep
  • In truth the text also reflects the events themselves, such as during the final exploration when the cieling rises as does the text, and vice versa. Further perpetuating (as well as the below example and the Title itself) that the book is the house.(leaves can mean pages in some circumstances) -Lucky 58
  • When I received my paperback copy of House of Leaves, I was rather annoyed to find that the cover had been folded wrong, so that it was smaller than the rest of the book. I'm still not sure whether or not this is an error, but even if it is, it makes the inside of the book smaller than the outside. - User:King Zila
    • This was done on purpose. It's a shout out to when the House first starts showing signs of weirdness, when they start to measure the lengths of the inside as compared to the outside. The hardcover is done the same way.

• Fridge Horror: So if Pelafina lied when she said she had tried to strangle Johnny...where the hell did the scars in Johnny's neck that his boss also sees came from?
  • Maybe not Fridge Horror exactly but one certainly has to wonder -- exactly how long was it after Johnnie saw the poor starving little Pekinese that she decided she'd throw it out of the moving car with enough force to crush its skull on the pavement?
  • when thinking about this book, every time i remind myself of this fact i sent shivers up my own spine. Zampano is writing about a documentary he saw, he's also blind.
• Fridge Logic: Those cameras Will uses for his documentary? They run on pure plot device, the most powerful fuel known to man)
  • However, one would think a highly accomplished photographer would remember spare batteries...
    • Outside of the house, maybe. Inside, all bets are off.
  • Exactly how long is The Navidson Record? There's no way everything that was shown in that documentary fit into a film even as long as the Director's Cut of Return of the King.
    • Possible Fridge Brilliance: What else is too big for its own dimensions?
    • I read that and immediately thought about the dimensions of a picture, until I saw the bue.
  • Also, some newer versions of the book include a page of The Navidson Comic in the appendix. If Zampàno is blind and The Navidson Record doesn't really exist, who drew that page?
    • EXACTLY. That chapeter is entitled "contrary evidence" and it's filled with evidence that it does in fact exist.
• At the books close, Navidson begins to burn a book so he has light to read by, reducing it to one page. Once he finishes, the house around him vanishes, leaving him plummeting into the dark. What book did he just burn? The House of Leaves.
  • Same poster, different observation. The untitled poem by Zampano suggests "...this great blue world of ours, seems a house of leaves, moments before the wind." Our great blue world, seems a house... is the house in blue a reference to our world made based on this poem?
  • The House of Leaves book appears once before. Note Tom grabs one of the thicker books off Navy's shelf on Chapter IV, causing the others to topple and reveal the new extension to the house. While the book is never named, House of Leaves is certainly a lunker.