The Book on the Bookshelf - Hardcover

Petroski, Henry

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0375406492 ISBN 13: 9780375406492

Publisher: Alfred a Knopf Inc, 1999

Synopsis

Tracing the evolution of the book and its companion, the bookshelf, an intriguing study ranges from the scrolls of antiquity to the modern-day volume, explaining how the art of book storage evolved, and discusses such topics as libraries, bookselling, book collection, and book buying throughout history. 25,000 first printing. Tour.

About this title

About the Author

Henry Petroski is the Aleksandar S. Vesic Professor of Civil Engineering and Professor of History at Duke University, where he also serves as chairman of the department of civil and environmental engineering.  Before moving to Duke in 1980, he was on the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin and on the staff of Argonne National Laboratory.

His books include: To Engineer is Human, which he also adapted for a BBC-television documentary; The Pencil; The Evolution of Useful Things; Design Paradigms; Engineers of Dreams; Invention by Design; and Remaking the World. He also writes the engineering column in American Scientist, and lectures widely.

Henry Petroski has been a Guggenheim Fellow

From the Inside Flap

called "the poet laureate of technology" and a writer who is "erudite, witty, thoughtful, and accessible." Now Henry Petroski turns to the subject of books and bookshelves, and wonders whether it was inevitable that books would come to be arranged vertically as they are today on horizontal shelves. As we learn how the ancient scroll became the codex became the volume we are used to, we explore the ways in which the housing of books evolved. Petroski takes us into the pre-Gutenberg world, where books were so scarce they were chained to lecterns for security. He explains how the printing press not only changes the way books were made and shelved, but also increased their availability and transformed book readers into books owners and collectors. He shows us that for a time books were shelved with their spines in, and it was not until after the arrival of the modern bookcase that she spines faced out.

In delightful digressions, Petroski lets Sene

Edition details

• Publisher: Alfred a Knopf Inc
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0375406492
• ISBN 13: 9780375406492
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 290