"Behind the great pies of history--the eel pie, the oyster pie, the pumpkin pie, the Christmas pie and that henchman of cardiac arrest, the Mississippi Mud Pie--there stands the humble and inedible ancestor that is the subject of this book. For what is the mud pie if not the proto-pie, first friuit of the primal ooze? And what is the making of mud pies if not the first working model of all human makings? But it took John Cage to see that, just as it took John Cage to release the music so long sealed up in silence. And it took Lois Long to let in the sunlight and make the candles sprakle like starshell"--Note on 'Mud book' by John Russell.