Zero to Lazy Eight: The Romance Numbers [Paperback]

Alexander Humez (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0671742817 | ISBN-13: 978-0671742812 | Publication Date: August 5, 1994 | Edition: First Touchstone Edition

Did you ever wonder why a stitch in time saves nine and not, say, four, or why the number seven is considered the luckiest, or what number the word googol refers to? Well, the Humez brothers, along with Joseph Maguire, have answered all of these questions and more. In "Zero to Lazy Eight", they take us on a wacky and enlightening trip up the linguistic number scale from zero to thirteen and back by way of infinity, showing us just what numbers can tell us about our culture's past, present, and future. Whether it be numerical maxims, mathematical theory, or numeric etymology, there is something here for everyone.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

"Take five," "behind the eight ball" and "looking out for number one" are phrases that suggest how deeply ingrained numbers are in our daily thought. Combining irreverent wit and erudition, this enjoyable smorgasbord of number lore explains the origins of dozens of phrases, while also tracing hundreds of word origins, from "abundant" to "zip code" (Zone Improvement Program). Each chapter centers on an integer from zero to 13, with a final chapter on infinity (whose symbol is a "lazy eight" in cowherd branding lingo). The authors, though, freely head off on multiple tangents to delve into left-handedness, mistaken identities, colonial American weights and currencies, internal body rhythms, creation myths, notions of the afterlife, clothing sizes and much else. The Humezes ( Alpha to Omega ) and freelancer Maguire cram an astonishing array of facts and lore into their excursion.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Earlier works by Alexander and Nicholas Humez were alphabet books for grownups ( ABC Et Cetera , LJ 11/1/85; Alpha to Omega , LJ 7/81), and this is a kind of counting book for grownups. The entertaining free-form essays on numbers 1 through 13 (plus zero and infinity) discuss the linguistic roots of numerical expressions and related folklore, idioms, and mathematical diversions. For instance, the chapter on number 6 starts with the expression "six of one and half a dozen of the other" and goes on to discuss ways of talking about symmetry and equality, puns and jokes (linguistic mapping), mathematical mapping, set theory, syllogisms, and socialism. This book is fun to read, and it contributes a linguistic angle to the idea of numeracy, but given its approach, promoting it as a reference book is a mistake. Newbridge Book Club alternate.
- Amy Brunvand, Fort Lewis Coll. Lib., Durango, Col.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Touchstone; First Touchstone Edition edition (August 5, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671742817
• ISBN-13: 978-0671742812
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,339,235 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Perfect Ten (Five, then, but it should be ten), July 31, 2003

By 

Ian S. McLean "theseaotter" (Guilford, VT USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Zero to Lazy Eight: The Romance of Numbers (Hardcover)

As the editorial review stated, phrases containing numbers are integral to our everyday speech, yet we would be in many cases hard pressed to explain what they mean, exactly, or where they came from. This book manages to impart vast amounts of information about these and many other topics in a conversational way that makes it seem natural to go from talking about turtles to discussing the freezing point of the universe. I've used this book as source material for at least one school paper, and for entertainment the rest of the time. Great for anyone interested in the history of words, or of numbers, or of something completly else, as it contains all of this.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Number-Think, February 10, 2010

By 

Hippoclides (Western Reserve) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Zero to Lazy Eight: The Romance Numbers (Paperback)

The Humez brothers, Alexander and Nicholas, are joined by Joseph Maguire in this exploration of numbers and the way we talk and think about them: four-square, dresses to the nines, at sixes and sevens, and so on. This book does for number theory (the most accessible branch of mathematics, and something we use every day without thinking about it) what the previous Humez bros. books ABC Et Cetera and Alpha to Omega did for Roman and Greek culture respectively: Everything you needed to know but never got around to asking (or did but your math teacher told you to siddown and shuddup while the guys with the slide rules in the front row performed mind-boggling computations with infuriating facility). This is math for the rest of us, from the viewpoint of its social embedding. Lots of anecdotes and curiosities here, such as the Seven Bridges of Koenigsberg problem and the surprising proof that there are several sizes of infinity. Occasionally dry but never dull, and Maguire's voice blends so well with the other two authors as to make this a virtually seamless collaboration.