Cartographies of Time
by Daniel Rosenberg and Anthony Grafton
In graduate school, I did laser chemistry. The lab was upstairs. The library was on the first floor in the back of the building, down a long corridor lined with organic chemistry labs – mostly R. B. Woodward’s group. I was a bit of a loner, and my experiment at one point had to be run at night, so I didn’t know a lot of these synthons very well.
I distinctly remember wondering, as I walked to the library, what would happen if someone published some really earth-shaking result outside our province of laser photochemistry. Would anyone think to tell me?
That’s how I feel today as I greet Grafton and Rosenberg’s new Cartographies of Time: a history of the timeline.
- I've been writing a bit about timelines.
- I’ve been working a lot to add timelines to Tinderbox, both integrated in Tinderbox and for sharing on the Web.
- This book was published in March 2010. That’s eight months ago!
Was anybody planning on mentioning it? Or are you having too much fun, waiting for me to stumble across it by chance?
I think this is an opportunity for booksellers. I’d pay for good recommendations. I’m not sure how to do this fairly; I don’t want to pay for every recommendation, just like I probably wouldn’t buy every single book that even my favorite bookseller might recommend. And I don’t really want to be penalized too harshly with shipping and discounts; amazon is really good at fulfillment. So perhaps we’d do this as a subscription service or some sort. Semi-custom book reviews are really on-trend. Book bloggers take note (and get in touch if you want to talk: Email me. )