The Book

Keith Houston takes apart the book as a physical object, tracing the separate histories of paper, ink, printing technology, illustration, and bookbinding across more than two thousand years. Each chapter follows one component's evolution — from cuneiform tablets and papyrus scrolls through medieval manuscripts to Gutenberg's press and modern mass production.

Richly illustrated throughout, the book treats the humble physical book as a technology worth understanding in its own right, as significant to civilization as the words printed on its pages.