Editing House of Leaves (section)

==Background==
Danielewski dates the origin of the novel to 1990 and a story that he wrote after finding out that his father was dying:

<blockquote>1990. My father was head of the USC School of Theater. I was living in New York. Then I got the phone call. The 'Mark your father is dying' phone call. He was in the hospital. Renal failure, cancer. I got on a Greyhound bus and headed west. Over the course of three sleepless nights and three sleepless days I wrote a 100+ page piece entitled Redwood. I remember using a fountain pen. I barely had the change to buy sodas and snacks along the way and there I am scratching out words with this absurdly expensive thing of polished resin and gold. I'd like to say it was a Pelikan, but I don't think that's correct. Another thing I seem to remember: the paper I was writing on had a pale blue cast to it. There was also something about how the pen seemed to bite into the paper at the same time as it produced these lush sweeps of ink. A kind of cutting and spilling. Almost as if a page could bleed. My intention had been to present this piece of writing as a gift to my father. As has been mentioned many times before, my father responded with the suggestions that I pursue a career at the post office. I responded by reducing the manuscript to confetti, going so far as to throw myself a pity parade in a nearby dumpster. My sister responded by returning later to that dumpster, rescuing the confetti, and taping it all back together.<ref name="Carpenter 2010">{{Cite web |url=http://chuckpalahniuk.net/interviews/mark-danielewski |title=The Brash Boy, The Misunderstood Girl and The Sonogram – The Books of Mark Z. Danielewski |last=Carpenter |first=Kasey |date=September 15, 2010 |website=The Cult: The Official fan site of Chuck Palahniuk |publisher=VEM |via=Wayback Machine |access-date=April 11, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170410094346/http://chuckpalahniuk.net/interviews/mark-danielewski |archive-date=10 April 2017 |url-status=dead}}</ref></blockquote>

Writing ''House of Leaves'' took ten years, and between 1993 and 1999, Danielewski made a living as a tutor, barista, and plumber. He eventually found a [[literary agent]] in Warren Frazier, who, according to Danielewski, "fell in love with it."<ref name="Carpenter 2010" /> They went to roughly thirty-two publishers before Edward Kastenmeier from Pantheon decided to take on the project.<ref name="Carpenter 2010" /> Small sections of the book were downloadable off the internet before the release of the first edition, and it is said that these sections "circulated through the underbellies of Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and San Francisco, through strip clubs and recording studios, long before publication"{{snd}}though very few were able to experience the book this way initially.<ref name="Rossa and Biondi 2015">{{Cite web|url=http://markzdanielewski.info/hol/firsts.html|title=Firsts Magazine Article relating to the First Editions of MZD's House of Leaves and Other Works Related to the Novel|last=Rossa and Biondi|first=Jesse and Lee|date=2001|website=markzdanielewski.info|publisher=VEM|access-date=April 11, 2016}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://therumpus.net/2015/05/the-rumpus-interview-with-mark-danielewski/|title=The Rumpus Interview with Mark Z. Danielewski|last=Foley|first=Dylan|date=May 20, 2015|website=therumpus.net|publisher=The Rumpus Book Club|access-date=April 11, 2016}}</ref>

The first edition hardback, which featured special signed inserts, was released on February 29, 2000,<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.onlyrevolutions.com/|title=Only Revolutions' Author Page|date=2006|website=onlyrevolutions.com|publisher=VEM|access-date=April 11, 2016}}</ref> and Pantheon released the hardback and paperback editions simultaneously on March 7, 2000.<ref name="Rossa and Biondi 2015" /> The novel went on to win the New York Public Library's Young Lions Fiction Award<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.salon.com/2001/05/01/young_lions/|title=The Young Lions|last=Salon Staff|date=May 1, 2001|website=www.salon.com|access-date=April 13, 2016}}</ref> and gain a considerable [[cult following]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://forums.markzdanielewski.com/|title=Mark Z. Danielewski Forum|date=February 29, 2000|website=Mark Z. Danielewski Forums|publisher=VEM|access-date=April 11, 2016}}</ref> ''House of Leaves'' has been translated into numerous languages, including Dutch, French, German, Greek, Italian, Japanese, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Serbian, Spanish, and Turkish. It has been taught in universities.