Library: An Unquiet History

Rating:
Summary: Library Trivia
Review: Although I did find the language very dry, I thought that this book was full of great detail. A lot of the information was new to me: such as the ancient "trash bin" that turned out to be a treasure trove of manuscripts, and what REALLY happened in Alexandria.

If you're interested in the history of knowledge, or interested in libaries in general, I definately recomend this book. It's relatively short, so it's a pretty quick read.

Rating:
Summary: An Unquiet History That Needs To Be Heard
Review: Although the purposes and processes change, libraries rise and libraries fall and Matthew Battles has given us a short, engaging, and illustrative history of libraries in Library: An Unquiet History. The destruction of libraries isn't always at the hands of human beings [decomposition and disintegration happen whether we help or not] and the destruction of libraries at the hands of humans has not always been as pat as conventional stories relate [I like the Hypatia and the mad mob version of the destruction of the library at Alexandria, but as romantic as the story is, the real fall of the library at Alexandria was far more complex.]. Battles' book can be very depressing at times [especially for the extreme bibliophile], but ultimately ends on a hopeful note. When I donate a book to the library at the high school where I teach, I am aware of the fact that the book may never see any use. This seems to confirm Battles' thought that "the library may seem the place where books go when they die." But every once in a while, one of my students comes up to show me a book and says, "Look what I found in the library!" And so I keep on donating books. I recommend you read Matthew Battles' Library: An Unquiet History and find reason to hope.

Rating:
Summary: Not the book I'd hoped for, sadly
Review: Being a library science graduate student, I was eager to read this book, thinking it would be an inspiring trip through the ages regarding my chosen field, so I was somewhat disappointed by what I found to be fairly dry reading. The history aspect is indeed there and the text is clearly well-researched, but the inspiration is lacking, unfortunately.

The tone of the author is very subdued and rather droning, which makes for somewhat dull reading in my opinion; I had hoped for a more proactive voice but Battles just doesn't seem very excited about his subject and thus the book sometimes comes across like an intelligent but uninspired history textbook. However, it would serve as a decent reference book for students of this field; I myself was able to use some of its material as a resource in a paper for one of my library science classes.

Ironically, I wish I'd checked this one out of the library instead of purchasing it.