1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910823347203321

Autore

Manguel Alberto

Titolo

The Library at Night / / Alberto Manguel

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New Haven, CT : , : Yale University Press, , [2008]

©2008

ISBN

1-282-08947-1

9786612089473

0-300-14521-7

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (384 p.)

Disciplina

027

Soggetti

Libraries - History

Books and reading

Social Sciences

Romance Literatures

Languages & Literatures

Spanish Literature

Library & Information Science

Electronic books.

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Foreword -- The Library as Myth -- The Library as Order -- The Library as Space -- The Library as Power -- The Library as Shadow -- The Library as Shape -- The Library as Chance -- The Library as Workshop -- The Library as Mind -- The Library as Island -- The Library as Survival -- The Library as Oblivion -- The Library as Imagination -- The Library as Identity -- The Library as Home -- Conclusion -- Acknowledgments -- Notes -- Image Credits -- Index -- Alberto Manguel's Non-Canonical List of Favorite Books

Sommario/riassunto

Inspired by the process of creating a library for his fifteenth-century home near the Loire, in France, Alberto Manguel, the acclaimed writer on books and reading, has taken up the subject of libraries. "Libraries," he says, "have always seemed to me pleasantly mad places, and for as



long as I can remember I've been seduced by their labyrinthine logic." In this personal, deliberately unsystematic, and wide-ranging book, he offers a captivating meditation on the meaning of libraries. Manguel, a guide of irrepressible enthusiasm, conducts a unique library tour that extends from his childhood bookshelves to the "complete" libraries of the Internet, from Ancient Egypt and Greece to the Arab world, from China and Rome to Google. He ponders the doomed library of Alexandria as well as the personal libraries of Charles Dickens, Jorge Luis Borges, and others. He recounts stories of people who have struggled against tyranny to preserve freedom of thought-the Polish librarian who smuggled books to safety as the Nazis began their destruction of Jewish libraries; the Afghani bookseller who kept his store open through decades of unrest. Oral "memory libraries" kept alive by prisoners, libraries of banned books, the imaginary library of Count Dracula, the library of books never written-Manguel illuminates the mysteries of libraries as no other writer could. With scores of wonderful images throughout, The Library at Night is a fascinating voyage through Manguel's mind, memory, and vast knowledge of books and civilizations.