Motel of the Mysteries was published by Houghton Mifflin in 1979. The premise: in 1985, the entire continent of North America was buried under a catastrophic accumulation of junk mail, advertising circulars, and third-class bulk rate material (a prediction that now reads as merely premature rather than absurd). Four thousand years later, the amateur archaeologist Howard Carson stumbles upon a sealed chamber — the undisturbed room of a twentieth-century motel — and interprets its contents according to the archaeological methods of his time.
Every object in the room is misidentified with devastating comic precision: the toilet is a “Sacred Urn” used in purification rituals; the television is a “Great Altar” before which the deceased knelt in prayer; the “Do Not Disturb” sign is a sacred seal indicating the sanctity of the burial chamber; the bathtub is a ceremonial pool; the shower cap becomes a “Sacred Headress.” The “Internal Component Enclosure” (the toilet’s tank) contains “Sacred Scrolls” (the toilet paper).
The satire operates on multiple levels: it mocks the tendency of archaeologists to assume ritual significance for mundane objects; it mocks the absurdity of everyday American life when viewed from outside; and it raises genuine epistemological questions about whether we can ever truly understand a vanished culture from its material remains alone.
Collecting Motel of the Mysteries
First edition (Houghton Mifflin, Boston, 1979): Hardcover with dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $30–$75
- Very good: $10–$30
- Frequently reprinted — first editions identifiable by number line