On Paper: The Everything of Its Two-Thousand-Year History (ALA Notable Books for Adults)

By Nicholas A. Basbanes

Book Overview

A Best Book of the Year: Mother Jones * Bloomberg News * National Post * Kirkus In these pages, Nicholas Basbanes--the consummate bibliophile's bibliophile--shows how paper has been civilization's... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0307266427
• ISBN13: 9780307266422
• Release Date: October 2013
• Publisher: Knopf
• Length: 448 Pages
• Weight: 1.81 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.7" x 1.6" x 6.6"

Customer Reviews

If it resembles paper, it is in the book.

I have a great time reading about all things paper. I had a slow start as the first sentence in the first chapter talks about the city of Cambulac (Beijing). However, because it was quoting the travels of Marco Polo, I had to look up the city. You will need a good historical background or a good dictionary. You just have to have a good background in a wide range of subjects to pick up all the nuances. We start long before paper and go through its two-thousand-year history, and conclude with how paper is a reference concerning “911”. The chapters overlap chronologically with different inferences on paper use. In the Chapter named “Goddess by the Stream,” we get a picture of the paper balloon bombs the J-a-p-a-n-e-s-e sent through the jet stream to the U.S. in WWII. There is a lot of general information on papermaking, which brings me back to the papermaking classes I had in elementary school. With the advent of electronics, many of the paper functions have been usurped. I wonder if someday it may not meet the same fate as papyrus. In any event, the book is worth re-reading and keeping as a reference. Speaking of reference, this book has a fantastic and extensive bibliography.