The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance

by Henry Petroski

Overview

Henry Petroski traces the origins of the pencil back to ancient Greece and Rome, writes factually and charmingly about its development over the centuries and around the world, and shows what the pencil can teach us about engineering and technology today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780679734154
Publisher:	Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Publication date:	11/28/1992
Edition description:	REP
Pages:	448
Sales rank:	102,838
Product dimensions:	5.26(w) x 9.26(h) x 0.97(d)

About the Author

Henry Petroski is the Aleksandar S. Vesic Professor of Civil Engineering and a professor of history at Duke University. The author of more than a dozen books, he lives in Durham, North Carolina, and Arrowsic, Maine. 

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Very engaging and wonderfully informative.... The Pencil unfolds a history of invention, craftsmanship, engineering, manufacture and business that is also at times a history of cultural life on both sides of the Atlantic...No reader of this book will ever be able to pick up a pencil again without marveling."

— Hilton Kramer, Newsday

"So engrossing that I read it through in one sitting... An utterly absorbing history

— Martin Gardner, Raleigh News and Observer

"Beguiling...surprising, entertaining, informative. One could scarcely ask a book to be more!... using the story of the pencil as a paradigm, Petroski shows how the process of engineering unfolds and [how] the pencil is the end result of process that parallels those by which products of much greater sophistication — computers, for example — are invented designed manufactured and improved."

— Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World

"A serious and charming history... Petroski argues his case with wry humor and an amplitude of anecdotage drawn from many centuries and continents. The Pencil is that great rarity, a book that will appeal to ordinary readers and yet seems destined as well to become a minor classic in academe."

— Cullen Murphy, The Atlantic

"You will never feel the same about the pencil after you read this terrific book."

— Larry King, USA Today

Editorial Reviews

"Very engaging and wonderfully informative.... The Pencil unfolds a history of invention, craftsmanship, engineering, manufacture and business that is also at times a history of cultural life on both sides of the Atlantic...No reader of this book will ever be able to pick up a pencil again without marveling."

-- Hilton Kramer, Newsday

"So engrossing that I read it through in one sitting... An utterly absorbing history

-- Martin Gardner, Raleigh News and Observer

"Beguiling...surprising, entertaining, informative. One could scarcely ask a book to be more!... using the story of the pencil as a paradigm, Petroski shows how the process of engineering unfolds and [how] the pencil is the end result of process that parallels those by which products of much greater sophistication -- computers, for example -- are invented designed manufactured and improved."

-- Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World

"A serious and charming history... Petroski argues his case with wry humor and an amplitude of anecdotage drawn from many centuries and continents. The Pencil is that great rarity, a book that will appeal to ordinary readers and yet seems destined as well to become a minor classic in academe."

-- Cullen Murphy, The Atlantic

"You will never feel the same about the pencil after you read this terrific book."

-- Larry King, USA Today

From the Publisher