A History of the Book in 100 books.
By Roderick Cave and Sara Ayad. Crows Nest. $35.
Professor Roderick Cave and Sara Ayad trace humankind's 5000-year quest to communicate ideas and knowledge through 100 "books", organised chronologically and divided thematically.
Apart from printed books, their choice of knowledge content is diverse. Peruvian khipu strings feature alongside books on bone, bark, palm leaves, clay tablets, and papyrus scrolls, as well as digital forms. The authors have excluded books that, in their opinion, need no further publicity. So, the King James Bible is omitted but the Gustav Vasa Bible is in. Shakespeare is out but Borges is in.
The authors provide introductions to the 11 chapters, as well as commentary on the individual items. Selections are often illustrated in colour, such as Gutenberg's 42-Line Bible (1454), the Armenian T'oros Roslin Gospels, and the Book of Kells, housed in Trinity College Dublin. The key role of libraries in the preservation of major works, such as the Bodleian Library in Oxford and the British Library, is highlighted.
The entries cover a diversity of content and product. Thus, the chapter "The Great Classics" covers the emergence of Aesop's Fables to the first cookbook, by Apicius. "Wheels of Change" covers a period of firsts, including the invention of moveable type; the first joke book; the first printing in Africa and the first printed music.
"Digitisation and the Future of the Book" covers a resurgence in interest of handcrafted books, artists books, and manga publishing. E-books, widely defined, include the RAND Corporation's 1955 compilation, A Million Random Digits, and the first ever e-book, claimed to be the Mechanical Encyclopedia from Spanish school teacher Angela Ruiz Robles.
The most pleasing aspect of the book is perhaps its global coverage with items, for example, from Korea, Burma and Ethiopia. Australia is represented within the section "Marketing for the Colonies" by Rolf Boldrewood's Robbery Under Arms, in the Macmillan Colonial Library edition.
A History of the Book in 100 Books is a well-priced compendium of entries that reveal the depth and breadth of human communication and knowledge. Many will take comfort in Cave and Ayad's conclusion that the traditional book still has a long future.
Colin Steele is a Canberra reviewer.
