Thirteen

An exploration of the mysterious power of the superstitions surrounding the number 13, still potent enough in our supposedly rational age that apartment buildings and hotels often lack a unit number 13, or even the entire 13th floor. Cott is clearly one who makes a point of dancing with danger and walking with studied insouciance under ladders--he joined Philadelphia's Friday the 13th Club on that very date--but his book is filled with trivia of decidedly unthreatening import (Thomas Jefferson was born on April 13th) that puts only true 13-phobes at risk. Cott records that the composer Arnold Schoenberg, fearful of dying at age 76 (get it?) on Friday the 13th, took to his bed, but died at 13 minutes to midnight.