With humour, the Scottish historian John Hill Burton paints a portrait of book hunters: the collector who ends up buying a second copy of a book he already owns, the browser who rummages through second-hand bookshops, the regular at auctions, the reader who reads a bit of everything. He also tells of the birth of the great libraries and of book collectors' clubs, such as the Roxburghe Club.
A learned and good-humoured book for everyone who loves books and old editions. This edition opens with the author's biography, written by his widow.
Its chapters can be read one by one, at your own pace, in the language you are learning.
