Index, A History Of The

Most of us give little thought to the back of the book — it’s just where you go to look things up. But as Dennis Duncan reveals in this delightful and witty history, hiding in plain sight is an unlikely realm of ambition and obsession, sparring and politicking, pleasure and play. In the pages of the index, we might find Butchers, to be avoided, Cows that sh-te Fire, or even catch Calvin in his chamber with a Nonne. 

"The cleverly punctuated title of Dennis Duncan’s book, Index, A History of the, should signal that this isn’t a dry account of a small cogwheel in the publishing machine. Instead, it is an engaging tale of the long search for the quickest way to find what you need in those big, information-rich things called books."  -  Steven Moore, The Washington Post

Revealing its vast role in our evolving literary and intellectual culture, Duncan shows that, for all our anxieties about the Age of Search, we are all index-rakers at heart — and we have been for eight hundred years.