The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

What do George Washington and Karl Marx have in common? That's right: They both loved Tristram Shandy, my fifth-favorite book. (Scorpion and Felix, A Humoristic Novel, Marx's try at a humoristic novel, is inspired by Tristram Shandy).

Simply put--Tristram Shandy is very, very funny. The first chapter of the book is entirely about how the titular character had a bad start because his mother asked his father a question about household chores at his moment of conception. It should be impossible for a book written in the 1760s to be postmodern, and yet.

(One last tidbit: You know that line from Hamilton, where Burr says "The world was wide enough for both Hamilton and me"? That's a direct allusion to Tristram Shandy. Burr wrote in real life "Had I read Sterne more and Voltaire less, I should have known the world was wide enough for both Hamilton and me.")