Papyrus: The Invention of Books in the Ancient World

We are the only animals who imagine fables, who scatter darkness with stories, who learn to live with chaos thanks to the tales we tell, who stoke the ember of fires with the air of their words, who travel great distances to carry their chronicles to strangers. And when we share the same stories, we are no longer strangers anymore.

from Papyrus by Irene Vallejo
What a delightful book! The book is as gorgeous as the writing, so I looked forward to holding it and reading it every night. It took me on a journey back in time, to the first letters and first writing, to soft clay tablets that could be smoothed over, to the papyrus scrolls that ancient Egypt exported across the known world, to parchment and codices. What was in those fragile show more books, how they were preserved or destroyed, sheltered in libraries or lost in war or in conflagrations spurred by anger. It traces Western heritage from the Greeks, whose culture was adopted by the Romans (who were better at war than philosophy.)

This is the serious book lover’s dream of a book, wide ranging across time and topics, but always coming back to the attachment we have to books, their power to reach across time and space. Librarians are liberal heroes, in the past and today; our own local librarian watches people scan the shelves, bringing their complaints, pressuring the offerings to conform to their truth. In the ancient world, booksellers were punished for the books they sold. Books are dangerous things! They hold ideas and ideals that challenge the status quo.

Vallejo begins with a journey, thousands of years ago, when brave men crossed the world and risked everything to bring rare manuscripts back to Ptolemy for his library in Alexandrea. And she ends with the loss of literacy after the fall of Rome, and their revival with the printing press. Books no longer had to be hand copied by slaves, distributed to the few.

How my mind soared while reading, filled with insight–there is so much packed into this volume! It’s a book to return to, for the beautiful writing, and the knowledge, the sheer pleasure of reading it.

I received a free book from A. A. Knopf. My review is fair and unbiased. show less

Este es un libro sobre la historia de los libros. Un recorrido por la vida de ese fascinante artefacto que inventamos para que las palabras pudieran viajar en el espacio y en el tiempo. La historia de su fabricación, de todos los tipos que hemos ensayado a lo largo de casi treinta siglos: libros de humo, de piedra, de arcilla, de juncos, de seda, de piel, de árboles y, los últimos llegados, de plástico y luz.

Es, además, un libro de viajes. Una ruta con escalas en los campos de batalla de Alejandro y en la Villa de los Papiros bajo la erupción del Vesubio, en los palacios de Cleopatra y en el escenario del crimen de Hipatia, en las primeras librerías conocidas y en los talleres de copia manuscrita, en las hogueras donde ardieron show more códices prohibidos, en el gulag, en la biblioteca de Sarajevo y en el laberinto subterráneo de Oxford en el año 2000. Un hilo que une a los clásicos con el vertiginoso mundo contemporáneo, conectándolos con debates actuales: Aristófanes y los procesos judiciales contra humoristas, Safo y la voz literaria de las mujeres, Tito Livio y el fenómeno fan, Séneca y la posverdad...

Pero, sobre todo, esta es una fabulosa aventura colectiva protagonizada por miles de personas que, a lo largo del tiempo, han hecho posibles y han protegido los libros: narradoras orales, escribas, iluminadores, traductores, vendedores ambulantes, maestras, sabios, espías, rebeldes, monjas, esclavos, aventureras... Lectores en paisajes de montaña y junto al mar que ruge, en las capitales donde la energía se concentra y en los enclaves más apartados donde el saber se refugia en tiempos de caos. Gente común cuyos nombres en muchos casos no registra la historia, esos salvadores de libros que son los auténticos protagonistas de este ensayo. show less

This marvelous tome describes not only how books helped to shape the ancient world, but ours as well. In Papyrus, Spanish historian and philologist Irene Vallejo provides in rich detail how both the production of books and reading advanced, hand in hand, down through the centuries. She traces how the earliest texts were first set onto stone tablets, then on papyrus scrolls, and finally paper (a Chinese invention). Writing emerged from –– and at first mimicked –– humankind’s oral tradition, as the first readers spoke the earliest works aloud rather than perusing silently.

Vallejo’s book does not follow a strict chronological order; rather she jumps back and forth through time to present a complete picture of the topics show more addressed. While much of her story focuses on the importance of books in Greece, Alexandria, and Rome, it takes numerous detours to detail the emergence of published works across Europe during the Middle Ages. Also highlighted is the key role that libraries (and librarians) played to ensure the survival of countless manuscripts despite warfare, wanton destruction by rulers, and natural calamities.

Published in the US in 2022, Papyrus is a paean to the importance of the written word as it traces the birth of alphabetic script, literacy, and books’ lasting impacts on our world up to this day. A lively and captivating work, on almost every page there is a fresh discovery that is sure to inform and delight. Papyrus should be added to every reader’s short list. show less

While the subtitle of this work is not totally misleading, this really isn't a history of the invention of books. I think it's equal parts memoir and a consideration of how readers were created, with all the implications that flow from that. I actually enjoyed it quite a bit. However, whereas on completion I had seriously considered giving it five stars, the more I think about the work the slighter it feels. Still, I would read more essays from this lady.

There are great books about the history of writing, the history of books, the history of publishing, and the history of libraries--but this book is not one of them. It is instead an overlong and tedious personal essay about what specific ancient books have meant to this author. The books includes plenty of conjecture, romantic thoughts about libraries and writers, and "I imagine..." instead of a dispassionate account of historical evidence, enough to make me think this book should be reclassified as fiction. Not recommended.

A poorly translated title (the Spanish title translates as Infinity in a Reed) will cause some disappointment among those looking for a book specifically on the topic of papyrus or Egyptian writing. While these topics are discussed, they are not the true focus of the book, which is a beautifully written love letter to "the classics," i.e, the writings of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Go in with that topic in mind and you will be enthralled.

Un nuevo ensayo de filología. ¿Nuevo? Admítanse preguntas retóricas: ¿Aporta algo nuevo?¿Existe un enfoque diferente?¿Arriesga alguna hipótesis interesante?A todas estas cuestiones la respuesta se yergue inevitablemente lacónica: No. Y sin embargo, su estilo sencillo, sus incursiones literarias, sus citas conocidas… hacen que sea una obra amena y entretenida.
Aún así, no es suficiente. Un ensayo ha de ser riguroso, u original en sus planteamientos, o denso sin necesidad de ser farragoso, o, al menos, divulgativo. La obra de Irene Vallejo se queda escasa en casi todo. Y no parece que se deba a sus aptitudes: cultura parece que tiene e incluso raya en la erudición; sino a su actitud acomodaticia. Se ha instalado show more confortablemente, quizá por convicción, en el pensamiento mayoritario, a saber: leer es bueno, leer desarrolla el sentido crítico, los libros hacen libres a las personas,… Cualquier lector asiduo empatizará con estas ideas pero a poco que se les dedique algo de tiempo se observará que no son consistentes, al menos no dogmáticamente consistentes. Quizá debería aplicar su propia receta : “...sabemos que toda imagen edulcorada o reverencial de la cultura es ingenua, además de estéril.” (II Los caminos de Roma. Atrévete a recordar 48 p. 396) Ni todos los libros, ni todos los lectores, ni todas las lecturas son equiparables. Ni siquiera la obra es realmente divulgativa pues para aquellos con cierta cultura resulta parco en proposiciones; para el común de los lectores tampoco aporta nada, casi nada, que no conozcan ya, lo que se traduce en cierto engreimiento lector en lugar de reto intelectual, pues las citas y referencias son en su mayoría harto conocidas; por último, para aquellos lectores cuyo bagaje lector aún es incipiente, aunque válida, no es la mejor guía. Se echa en falta una evolución más detallada en tanto que objeto físico del protagonista de la obra: el libro; pareciendo que todo se desarrolló inevitablemente a lo largo de los siglos. .
En fin, es comprensible el éxito obtenido pues tanto estilo como contenido se dedican a arrullar al lector en lugar de provocarle, de desafiarle para que abandone su confortable papel de un biempensante amante de los libros. Un buen libro de entretenimiento, un mediocre ensayo para intelectuales mediocres (valga el oxímoron). show less