Reading Pictures
Alberto Manguel
Manguel—author of A History of Reading—turns his eye to how we “read” art. A welcome correlative to Berger’s Ways of Seeing.
Ways of reading
Things I’ve learned about the act of reading.
Of stoops and streets
On The Craftsman
On perfection
On The Craftsman
Small bricks and maker’s marks
On The Craftsman & Small Is Beautiful
Ritual and repetition
On The Craftsman & The Creative Habit
The Craftsman
Richard Sennet
Sennett defines craftmanship as the desire to do a job well for its own sake. In so doing, he frees it of the bounds of carpentry or metalwork and extends the work of craft to that of the programmer, the doctor, and the parent.
Advertising for the better
On Ways of Seeing & Deep Economy
Ways of Seeing
John Berger
Based on the BBC documentary, Berger begins with a retelling of Walter Benjamin’s Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction and concludes with a brilliant analysis of modern day advertising and its roots in Renaissance-era oil painting.
The Subversive Copy Editor
Carol Fisher Saller
Carol Fisher Saller’s irreverent guide to copy editing has helpful advice for working with writers, as well as guidance for writers about working with their editor.
On work
“Work” can mean toil or slog, but it can also mean creation, opus, oeuvre.
The work of food
On Deep Economy & Small Is Beautiful
The Art of Simple Food
Alice Waters
A beautifully designed book that has served me well in the kitchen.
Deep Economy
Bill McKibben
Bill McKibben indicts the current economic system for it’s single-minded pursuit of “more” without regard for whether or not it is (or can be) “better.”
Graphic Design
Adrian Shaughnessy
Shaugnessy’s irreverent guide—the ABC’s of design—addresses the underside of the designer’s life, with entries on banks, presentation skills, and sacking clients.
The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis
Lydia Davis
Davis’ shorts are very short—sometimes only a paragraph—but they leave impressions larger than the tiny space they consume.
Jan Tschichold, Master Typographer
Cees W. de Jong
Thames & Hudson’s tome to Jan Tschichold is as oversized as he was.
Orality and Literacy
Walter J. Ong
Perhaps the only book I’ve discovered that carefully and thoroughly addresses the differences between oral and literate cultures.
Proust and the Squid
Maryanne Wolf
Wolf addresses the ways in which the brain adapts—or fails to adapt—to reading.
Designing with Web Standards
Jeffrey Zeldman & Ethan Marcotte
The manual of web standards returns for a third edition, this time with the addition of the talented Ethan Marcotte.