A Place for Everything

A Place for Everything
Author: Judith Flanders
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 364
Release: 2020-10-20
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1541675061

From a New York Times-bestselling historian comes the story of how the alphabet ordered our world. A Place for Everything is the first-ever history of alphabetization, from the Library of Alexandria to Wikipedia. The story of alphabetical order has been shaped by some of history's most compelling characters, such as industrious and enthusiastic early adopter Samuel Pepys and dedicated alphabet champion Denis Diderot. But though even George Washington was a proponent, many others stuck to older forms of classification -- Yale listed its students by their family's social status until 1886. And yet, while the order of the alphabet now rules -- libraries, phone books, reference books, even the order of entry for the teams at the Olympic Games -- it has remained curiously invisible. With abundant inquisitiveness and wry humor, historian Judith Flanders traces the triumph of alphabetical order and offers a compendium of Western knowledge, from A to Z. A Times (UK) Best Book of 2020

Alphabetical

Alphabetical
Author: Michael Rosen
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2013-11-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 1848548877

From minding your Ps and Qs to wondering why X should mark the spot, Alphabetical is a book for everyone who loves words and language. Whether it's how letters are arranged on keyboards or Viking runes, textspeak or zip codes, this book will change the way you think about letters for ever. How on Earth did we fix upon our twenty-six letters, what do they really mean, and how did we come to write them down in the first place? Michael Rosen takes you on an unforgettable adventure through the history of the alphabet in twenty-six vivid chapters, fizzing with personal anecdotes and fascinating facts. Starting with the mysterious Phoenicians and how sounds first came to be written down, he races on to show how nonsense poems work, pins down the strange story of OK, traces our seven lost letters and tackles the tyranny of spelling, among many, many other things. His heroes of the alphabet range from Edward Lear to Phyllis Pearsall (the inventor of the A-Z), and from the two scribes of Beowulf to rappers. Each chapter takes on a different subject - codes, umlauts or the writing of dictionaries. Rosen's enthusiasm for letters positively leaps off the page, whether it's the story of his life told through the typewriters he's owned or a chapter on jokes written in a string of gags and word games. So if you ever wondered why Hawaiian only has a thirteen-letter alphabet or how exactly to write down the sound of a wild raspberry, read on . . .

Alphabetical Order

Alphabetical Order
Author: Tiphaine Samoyault
Publisher: Viking Juvenile
Total Pages: 40
Release: 1998
Genre: Education
ISBN:

Discusses the development of alphabets and writing systems from ancient societies to American Indian societies.

Alphabetical Sydney

Alphabetical Sydney
Author: Antonia Pesenti
Publisher: NewSouth
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2013
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 9781742233703

This is our Sydney, the brightest and best of it, North to the south to the east and the west of it. Bats and cicadas, lawn bowls and the zoo, This is our town. Let us share it with you.

Adirondack Alphabet

Adirondack Alphabet
Author: Sheri Amsel
Publisher: North Country Books
Total Pages: 36
Release: 1994
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780925168337

Alphabetical Africa

Alphabetical Africa
Author: Walter Abish
Publisher: New Directions Publishing
Total Pages: 168
Release: 1974
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 9780811205337

"Walter Abish has dovetailed his novel within a Procrustean scheme that has the terrifying and irrefutable logic of the alphabet. Alphabetical Africa is in the line of writers such as Raymond Roussel, Raymond Queneau, Georges Perec and Harry Mathews, who have used constrictive forms to penetrate the space on the other side of poetry." -- John Ashbery

Albert the Alphabetical Elephant

Albert the Alphabetical Elephant
Author: Roger Hargreaves
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 34
Release: 2017
Genre: Juvenile Nonfiction
ISBN: 0515157317

Albert the elephant teaches a little girl the letters of the alphabet with the aid of his unusual trunk.

Unpacking My Library

Unpacking My Library
Author: Leah Price
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2011-11-29
Genre: Photography
ISBN: 0300170920

As words and stories are increasingly disseminated through digital means, the significance of the book as object—whether pristine collectible or battered relic—is growing as well. Unpacking My Library: Writers and Their Books spotlights the personal libraries of thirteen favorite novelists who share their collections with readers. Stunning photographs provide full views of the libraries and close-ups of individual volumes: first editions, worn textbooks, pristine hardcovers, and childhood companions. In her introduction, Leah Price muses on the history and future of the bookshelf, asking what books can tell us about their owners and what readers can tell us about their collections. Supplementing the photographs are Price's interviews with each author, which probe the relation of writing to reading, collecting, and arranging books. Each writer provides a list of top ten favorite titles, offering unique personal histories along with suggestions for every bibliophile. Unpacking My Library: Writers and Their Books features the personal libraries of Alison Bechdel, Stephen Carter, Junot Díaz, Rebecca Goldstein and Steven Pinker, Lev Grossman and Sophie Gee, Jonathan Lethem, Claire Messud and James Wood, Philip Pullman, Gary Shteyngart, and Edmund White.