Alberto Manguel
For anyone interested in the craft of reading, Petroski's most recent exploration is a compulsive necessity...The charm lies not in the rigorous chronology but in the marginalia...
NY Times Book Review
Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly
That bookshelves might harbor secret and enchanting lives is a thrilling prospect for any serious reader. What laws of human nature govern our sturdy cases of books? What damning quirks of character glare from a few casually stowed volumes? In this disappointing study, however, Petroski's effort to reveal the "evolution of the bookshelf as we know it" yields few rewards. Pondering the physics of the bookend and the genealogy of the library carrel, this Duke University scholar observes the bookshelf as a piece of the infrastructure undergirding our civilization. We learn that medieval books were chained to their shelves to prevent theft, and that beverage stains have plagued bibliophiles almost since the dawn of the printed word. Admirers of Petroski's earlier works (The Evolution of Useful Things, Remaking the World, etc.) will not be surprised by his exquisite research, or by the gusto with which he plunges into the dustiest of library bins. But the bookshelf proves a more oblique topic than bridges or even pencils, two of Petroski's other interests. The practical construction principles of bookshelves make for rather dull reading, and conjecture about lectern usage in the Middle Ages wears thin. This book is most successful when delving into the gritty aspects of engineering, whether it be the cantilevered forces of library book stacks or the architecture of the British Museum Reading Room. After lingering among such fusty stacks, readers will welcome the whimsical appendix, which proposes arranging one's books alphabetically by the author's first name, or even by the first word of the antepenultimate sentence. (Sept.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
Library Journal
If "God is in the details" then those seeking God should read Petroski's books (including The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance and The Evolution of Useful Things). In all of his books, Petroski reveals the technological issues and surprising histories of everyday things. Here he details the evolution of the bookshelf. Most people, librarians included, think of bookshelves, if they think of them at all, as an inevitable response to the development of books. Petroski starts by questioning why books are shelved vertically on horizontal shelves with their spines out and follows with the story of how the storage and shelving of books as well as the design and construction of libraries has developed: from the scrolls and codexes of ancient times to medieval monastic libraries (where books were chained to desks) to the development of modern bookstacks, the evolution of compact shelves, and a consideration of the future of the book. Petroski includes delightful glimpses of noteworthy book collectors of the past and how they organized their books. Well written and richly illustrated, this book is not just for bibliophiles. Highly recommended.--Paul A. D'Alessandro, Portland P.L., ME Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
Booknews
Technology popularizer Petroski (civil engineering and history, Duke U.) traces how books have been stored and displayed during the course of their evolution from scroll to codex to modern volume. He describes how before Gutenberg and printing, books were so rare and valuable they were chained to lecterns for security, and how books were first shelved with their spines in rather than out. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)
Martin Gardner
No writer ever tried harder than Chesterton to convey to his readers a sense of wonder and mystery about common, everyday objects. The Book on the Shelf is a facinating history of two related common objects, impeccably documented and beautifully illustrated. It is impossible to put this book down without seeing bookshelves as the culminationof a long, colorful, little-noticed history.
Civilization
John Derbyshire
The Book on the Bookshelf is a pleasure to read, stocked with a wealth of fascinating, sometimes astonishing, detail yet never rambling or departing for long from its set course. It is an excellent companion for—could be shelved next to!Alberto Manguel's A History of Reading.
The New Criterion
Merle Rubin
The charm of this book lies in the way it helps us take a fresh look at an old, long-familiar object, seeing it, as its various inventors and innovators did, for the first time. Almost no detail however small, is unexamined.
The Christian Science Monitor
Kirkus Reviews
Petroski does for the bookcase what he did for The Pencil (1990) and for bridges in Engineer of Dreams (1995): offers an elaborately detailed history of a common item as an artifact.
From the Publisher
"For anyone interested in the craft of reading, [this book] is a compulsive necessity." The New York Times Book Review
"A fascinating history of two related common objects, impeccably documented and beautifully illustrated." Civilization
"After reading this book, you will not look at a book or a bookshelf in the same way." Seattle Times
"If 'God is in the details,' then those seeking God should read Petroski's books." Library Journal
Seattle Times
After reading this book, you will not look at a book or a bookshelf in the same way.”
Civilization
A fascinating history of two related common objects, impeccably documented.”
New York Times Book Review
For anyone interested in the craft of reading, [this book] is a compulsive necessity.”