One Good Turn: A Natural History of the Screwdriver and the Screw [Lingua inglese] - Brossura

Rybczynski, Witold

Brossura

ISBN 10: 0684867303 ISBN 13: 9780684867304

Casa editrice: Scribner, 2001

Riassunto

The Best Tool of the Millennium
The seeds of Rybczynski's elegant and illuminating new book were sown by The New York Times, whose editors asked him to write an essay identifying "the best tool of the millennium." An award-winning author who once built a house using only hand tools, Rybczynski has intimate knowledge of the toolbox -- both its contents and its history -- which serves him beautifully on his quest.
One Good Turn is a story starring Archimedes, who invented the water screw and introduced the helix, and Leonardo, who sketched a machine for carving wood screws. It is a story of mechanical discovery and genius that takes readers from ancient Greece to car design in the age of American industry. Rybczynski writes an ode to the screw, without which there would be no telescope, no microscope -- in short, no enlightenment science. One of our finest cultural and architectural historians, Rybczynski renders a graceful, original, and engaging portrait of the tool that changed the course of civilization.

Su questo libro

Recensione:

M. R. Montgomery The New York Times Book Review What Rybczynski sees is that everything that requires mechanical precision, and that includes the instrumentation of modern science, rises out of the perfection of the simple screw and the complex machinery required to manufacture these indispensable items.

Paul Challen The Toronto Star One Good Turn is a good, short read in the classic Rybczynksi mode -- an ordinary thing, explained extraordinarily.

L'autore:

Witold Rybczynski is the author of nine books, including Home, City Life, and the national bestseller A Clearing in the Distance, for which he won a Christopher Award and the J. Anthony Lukas Prize. He is a regular contributor to The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, and The New York Review of Books. He teaches at the University of Pennsylvania.

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Scribner
• Data di pubblicazione: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0684867303
• ISBN 13: 9780684867304
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero di pagine: 176