Customer Reviews

The Book on the Bookshelf

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(13)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

We may think that how books are stored is a mundane topic. But Petroski shows how both the book and its means of storage co-evolved, with features we take for granted about books (e.g., labels on spines, or titles) being in part due to the need to store them in growing numbers. It was fun to have an engineer's perspective on this issue, though his overall scholarship is impressive. There is something new and interesting here for all but the most specialized readers.

This book is thoroughly researched, well illustrated and written without engineering jargon so that the general reader will enjoy the story of the book and the shelf. I will forever look at libraries with renewed appreciation for not only their content but their structure. This book is a good complement for those bibliophiles who have read A Gentle Madness by Nicholas Basbanes.

The Book on the Bookshelf is Henry Petroski's sly look at how books are stored, and have been stored for centuries. It's sly, in part, because to tell you this he has to tell you the history of the book itself, and this of course leads him off in different directions. You learn much about not only books, and bookshelves, but scrolls, printing, various sorting systems, printing and spelling conventions over the years, and various other minutiae. If you're interested in this sort of thing, like I was, it's very interesting. I was fascinated to read, for instance, that the British publishing industry changed about a decade ago, and began printing their titles on the spines of books oriented the same way we do it. Previously they had printed the titles upside down (from our point of view) and the two books I'm referring to are old enough to display this. I'd noted it, but never knew why they were like that. Now I do. I'd recommend this book to anyone who's interested in books, publishing, and the history of those things. I will warn you that the author does tend to get into his subject, digress a bit, and run away with his topic now and again, but I generally found this characteristic charming rather than annoying.

Henry Petroski's The Book on the Bookshelf traces the evolution of how books were and are stored from the time they were scrolls into modern libraries with movable shelving. There are many interesting facts throughout this book. One of its great joys is picturing a reader, like yourself, in earlier times and imagining them prowling through a bookshop set up in an entirely different fashion than is done in a bookstore now (and that is not even taking into account such places as ... where there are no book shelves for the reader to see). The only drawback to the book is that sometimes the writing and the subject can be a little dry and grow stale, particulary as the story goes on. Still, it is filled with much interesting information.

I enjoyed this meticulously researched history of the physical design of books, bookshelves and libraries. Petroski follows the evolution of book storage from pigeonholes used to store scrolls to modern space-saving "moveable-aisle" stacks. In the process, he also covers the changes in the physical design of books themselves and the ever-present challenges faced by libraries throughout the ages as more and more books appear on their shelves. An appendix covers a host of possible methods of organizing your personal book collection - this section is easily the most amusing part of the book.

Petroski includes interesting anecdotes and helpful illustrations to liven up this sometimes dry subject area. While not a gripping book, it definitely succeeds as a thoughtful study full of interesting nuggets of history. It's obvious that obsessive book lovers throughout the ages have put a lot of thought into storing their collections.

If you're not particularly interested in why books were once shelved spine in, or how library layouts have changed over the years, then this book will probably not hold your interest. Personally, I have fond and vivid memories of libraries, especially the one from my childhood. This book definitely has me looking at libraries in a whole new light - I'll never be able to walk into one again without studying the way it's laid out.

I came across Henry Petrosky's "The book on the bookshelf" when I was researching re-decorating options for my own library; and bought it, thinking I was buying just another work on general booklore and memorabilia. What an agreeable surprise when I discovered this is not such a book, but an exploration on the evolution of the bookshelf. For someone like me at that point in time, it was kismet.

Petroski takes us from the earliest historical evidence of the existence of bookshelves and libraries; exploring ancient lands, such as Egypt and the great lost library of Alexandria, the storing of scrolls in Ancient Rome, the chained manuscripts that monks copied and sweated over for months during the Middle Ages; to our modern computerized systems. Library design is studied and analyzed to the last detail using as examples the oldest, most celebrated libraries of our time, such as Oxford's Bodleian Library, Spain's El Escorial, the Vatican Library, and our very own Library of Congress. He even dares to imagine the "library of the future", fully digitalized, with computers at the base of each set of book stacks at the user's disposal for fast, easy researching of titles. He writes as a scientist and his ability to create a resolutely valid hypothesis out of what many would call an insignificant theme is remarkable. The book closes with an appendix on myriad methods on how to organize one's own private library bookshelves, an extended bibliography, and a full reference list of excellent engravings, blueprints and photos reproduced throughout.

As a booklover and collector, I found "The book on the bookshelf" interesting and with a fresh point of view on a usually languid, most talked about subject.

Although this volume contains much fascinating information about the evolution of the book, Petroski is most interested in how book storage systems have developed. It turns out that books have been stored in more ways--and in more peculiar ways--than an uninitiated reader might imagine. (Would you believe that most books were once shelved "backwards" with their fore-edge out and their title-less spine faced in?) Among Petroski's best chapters are the one that treats problems that arose when books had to be chained to their shelves and the one describing the development of modern library shelving so strong that it could support the library rather than the other way around. Petroski includes many fine illustrations that that well support his theses and educated guesses.

Committed bibliophiles may easily tolerate the discursive, not to say meandering, course of The Book on the Bookshelf. I reached the limit of my patience a couple of times and put the book back on the bookshelf for a while before finally completing it. That having been said, Petroski's ramble is just too self-indulgent and just plain too long, sort of an Atlantic Monthly essay that got away from the author. I absolve future readers from all guilt if they decide to skip pages and even whole sections of this clever work.

I enjoyed this book. The history of the book fasinates me and so I was eager to read this one. Petroski gives a good outline of the history of the book and the bookshelf, but does not do much else. I would have liked to have seen more of the philosophical reasons given for why the book changed form over time. He focused mainly on the physical reasons, but ignored any idealogical ones. Also he ignored the newest form of the book - the electronic book. So while his text was fun and a good overview of history, it left out a lot.

Don't expect long detailed chapters on any period of the book. He skims over the early age of the scroll and leaves a lot of questions about that time unanswered. Also, one has to get used to his abundance of personal examples. At first they are okay, but they drag on by the end of the book. But all in all, it is a fun read. I would supplement it with something like Alberto Manguel's A History of Reading, but it does add to the discussion of the subject.

Henry Petroski has done it again--describing the evolution, engineering and quirks of objects we all take for granted. Unfortunately, this Petroski effort isn't nearly as engrossing as his book on the pencil. But for bibliophiles and library lovers, I can't recommend this tome enough. Truth be told, there really have only been a handful (or two) of significant changes to bookshelf design over the last 500 years. Somehow, Petroski is able to expand on these subtle changes and create an entire book on the subject. It's fascinating, but ultimately you're left wondering why it took nearly 300 pages for this story to unfold.

It's not quite as fascinating as Petroski's "The Evolution of Useful Things," but I suspect that is because "The Book on the Bookshelf" is much more narrowly focused (the design of bookshelves, the structure of book bindings and, to a lesser extent, the organization of libraries). But it is a quick read and one that bibliophiles should find terribly interesting.