Who would have thought that a book about something as apparently mundane as indexes would make such fascinating reading. They are something we all take for granted; and integral part of daily life, whether part of a book or for filing, referencing etc. I’ve never thought about how important they are and just how chaotic life would be without them.

Dennis Duncan explores what could be quite a dry subject with energy and style. His narrative races along and there’s so much historic detail that I never expected. It’s thought provoking; particularly the way in which and the speed with which the internet is altering our approach. Packed with fascinating fact, incredibly well researched and one of my top non fiction titles of all time because it’s such a compelling and wide ranging read. I really enjoyed this.

My thanks to the publisher for a review copy via Netgalley.

'Evergreen, Anthony, his collection of fig-leaves for the ladies, 100'

Duncan has written a wonderful crossover book here which has the solid foundations and academic rigour for scholars, but which is as entertaining as it is informative and has an eye for the humorous, the ridiculous and the telling example to appeal to a general audience.

As someone who made a complete mess of indexing my first monograph (NB. the UK's one of two probably best known academic publishers does not use professional indexers and requires the author to index their own book, albeit with the embedded indexing software discussed in the final chapter) I am now first in line to support the importance of a good index but had little to no idea of the history of indexing - I do now!

From the introduction of alphabet-based organisation (ah, but which alphabet?) to the vastly amusing index wars of the eighteenth century, and onto the effective indexing that is Google search and hashtags, this puts the idea of search and information management into a Western cultural context. Duncan discusses subject indexes (not indices), concordances, Victorian attempts to create a universal index of knowledge (think Mr Casaubon in George Eliot's Middlemarch) and does it all with wit, an engaging sense of humour and genuine erudition. And I'm still giggling at the innocence of Susan Boyle's PR team who created a hashtag to promote the launch of her new album but without paying attention to how it might read: #susanalbumparty!

In lots of ways, this continues the scholarly interest in the history of the book, the history of reading, the book as material object (early chapters deal with scrolls, manuscripts and the codex before the advent of printed books) - and is good on how contemporary doom-mongering on how Google is making us all stupid is merely a reiteration of arguments against the index that have existed as long as the index itself. Enlightening, entertaining and amusing.

Indexes don’t exactly sound like the most scintillating of subjects, I guess. On the face of it, they’re such a utilitarian thing, and most of us don’t give them a second thought. But I really enjoy histories that dig into things we take for granted like this, and it’s usually surprisingly rewarding, so I thought this sounded like a good time — and I wasn’t wrong. It’s not just about the minutiae of how to create a good index (although that’s certainly part of it), but also about people’s attitudes to indexes, and what that says about people’s needs, wants and fears when it comes to literacy and scholarship.

The highlight of the book is probably Duncan’s delighted tour of how to use an index to be truly petty. Would you imagine that an index could cost a politician an election? Well, there’s at least one case where an index was a factor. Can you picture getting one over on your rival with a catty little index entry? There’s some really fascinating stuff lurking behind some indexes, and it’s fascinating.

I also thought the examples of using indexes as a format for telling fiction were interesting; as Duncan says, they don’t quite work because they can’t quite imitate the random, non-chronological format… but there are some really imaginative stories out there which give it a go.

Overall, this was everything I’d hoped for.

I have read this with fascination- a truly unique idea for a book - tracing the history of the index. All my life I have loved reading things and then afterwards, wanting to remember points would look in the index. It must be one of the most overlooked and ignored things in a book but surely it has to be one of the most important. A badly worked index is enough to throw the book away. Here Dennis Duncan the author has followed thir course through monasteries and libraries, coffee houses and all our homes. I laughed out loud at times: my favourite being J. Horace Round’s index of Feudal England that was written to correct the falsehoods of another author. In the index he gives vent to how he really feels about the howlers he has come across…..

Freeman, Professor: Unaquainted with the Int. Con. Cant. 4; ignores the Northamptonshire geld-roll 149; confuses the Inquistio geldi 149;

And so on. Great fun!

I love the title of this fascinating book. It is well written in a modern and very readable style and is full of interesting facts and snippets. I can see a paper copy ending up with my books about the compiling of the OED. With thanks to the publishers, the author and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review an e-ARC Of this book.

For bibliophiles, taxonomists and others with a hankering to classify and put things in order,

Throughout history, those resistant to change have accused the index of taking the place of books, of being something 'seedy, shameful', and the cause of people not reading books properly. This compact and learned book covers the evolution of the index and its response to shifts in the reading ecosystem.

Diverting.

Index, A History of the by Dennis Duncan explains how texts have been extended to meet the needs of readers to want to find a specific passage. An index entry usually tells us to turn to a specific page, so Duncan tells us about the introduction of page numbers by Walter Rolevinck in 1470. We expect an index to be in alphabetical order. Such ordering was first recorded in Ugarit, 1300 BCE, although Robert Cawdrey’s first English dictionary in 1604 contained instructions to the reader how to use the order of the alphabet to find words in the book. And, of course, we expect a Table of Contents at the beginning.

Many of us, when asked to describe an index, would probably think of something closer to a concordance. That is simply a list of words and where those words occur in the text. There is no context. For example, if you had a concordance for the Bible and looked for the word “sin”, I suspect that might be a large number of entries. The only way to find the one you want is by turning to the pages mentioned and reading them, looking for the relevant passage. If, however, those many references each showed the word in its context, you’d soon spot that you want John 8:7: “He that is without SIN among you, let him first cast a stone at her.”

A good indexer (and Duncan introduces us to the Society of Indexers) will give some context for the entry. And that’s where it can get juicy… The eighteenth century saw several spats between learned men where the index was used as a witty weapon. King’s index of a work by Richard Bentley has entries such as
Dr Bentley:
- his egregious dullness p. 74, 106, 119, 135, 136, 137, 241
- his pedantry pp 93-99, 144, 216
- his familiar acquaintance with Books that he never saw p.76, 98, 115, 232
Duncan tells us about novels that take the form of indexes to fictitious works, e.g. Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov. (And yes, real works of fiction were given indexes at one time.)

J. Horace Round performed a similar hatchet job on Edward Freeman in the late nineteenth century. Round published a book called Feudal England which disagrees with the views of Freeman. The 600 pages are a standard history textbook, simply taking a different interpretation than Freeman’s. As Duncan says, “In the index, however, the gloves come off”. He then quotes the devastating index entry in Round’s book – it takes a whole page, including
Freeman, Professor:
- confuses individuals 323-4, 386, 473
- his bias 319, 394-7
- imagine facts 352, 370, 387, 432
This is a lively and highly informative book about a subject that could be so dry. I shall never look upon a physical book (a codex formed of signatures, each signature comprising a number of leaves, I learnt) without remembering something from Duncan’s excellent book about the effort that has gone into making it useful.
#IndexAHistoryofthe #NetGalley

'A History of the Index' is a delightful book that focuses on a topic that I have never considered previously - where did the idea of an index develop? what role does it play? From a simple idea, a fascinating and unusual book develops to cover diverse topics from heresy to politics, language to modern catalogs. Using an index has played a far greater in society and also, in the scholastic years of my life, that I have ever contemplated. While indexes are undoubtedly useful, an index is not frequently viewed as fun - but don't make the same mistake when you read this title - this book is both a fun and engaging read. Don't overlook this book - read it and enjoy.

An interesting curio of a book. The history of indexes touches on so many things: from the evolution of language, to study, to language, to data managment on a massive scale.

Like the acts of writing and reading, compiling an index is necessarily subjective, and navigating this problem of perspective has meant that indexes have often been sites of political and philosophical tension. There's an engaging self-awareness to Duncan's history - even here it's impossible to escape the circle of subjectivity - that makes Index both an enlightening and entertaining read.

This is a fascinating little book, who would have thought an index was so carefully calculated? Whilst I am not much of an index user, to have read this book shows how the concept has evolved.

A great little read for all the bibliophiles out there.

Thank you NetGalley.

Should be indexed as a masterpiece! An erudite, engaging and thoughtful look at a tool that we might take for granted (in its back-of-book or Google forms), this maintains the balance between scholarly and genuinely interesting. Readers of the proof will enjoy the joke right at the end…!

Index, the humble.

Most of us use a variation of it without thinking, but how many of us know when the index was invented and how it came to be there? Where would the Argos catalogue be without its index? Indexes still exist and are used everyday in our techno-world. When we use Google, we are not searching the internet; we are searching Google’s index of the internet. “Index, A History of the” is a love letter to the omniscient, alphabetical list that lurks at the back of all self-respecting books (including this one); your last hope when you can't remember which page something was mentioned on. I love a good index myself and am perfectly at home using one. Many’s the time I’ve had a “What no index?” moment after buying a new book which you’d expect to have an index only to discover there isn’t one.
Author Dennis Duncan charts the index’s labyrinthine history in a lighthearted and supremely readable way. There’s been a welcome rash of unconventional and idiosyncratic books like this lately which is to be celebrated. This is a short book but it is wide-ranging and original. Every page has interesting facts that you probably didn't know you didn’t know. It is so filled with quirky nuggets that you will want to share them with total strangers (restrictions permitting). It is a pleasant journey into the development of the very mechanics of reading, and is also beautifully illustrated.

I am very grateful to Penguin Press UK and NetGalley for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book.

This is a curious and charming book. It's a book about books - more specifically, the last few pages of a book that you turn to if you can't remember where an entry was mentioned. A meta-meta book, if you will.

I'll confess - I don't think I've ever used an index. Not for study nor for leisure. Almost all of my reading since the turn of the century has been digital - so I hit
+

when I want to find something. And, if I'm honest, I thought that indexes (never indices) were compiled automatically. I had no idea that that in the modern world, it was someone's actual job to create a useful index.

The history of organising thought is extraordinary. Once we reached "Big Data" (too many scrolls to fit on a single shelf) it becomes obvious that humans need metadata to make sense of the vast troves of material we generate. The book goes from the earliest invention of indexing, through its surge is popularity, up to the modern day. It covers the fashions, the spats, and the technology which unlocked its popularity.

It almost exclusively focuses on English and Latin. It would have been nice to learn about non-European indexes.

If you're a lover of books, you'll love this. It is a warm and witty look at the development of reading technology - and how it has helped shape both the world and the written word. It has some beautiful images of early books which illustrate the main next nicely.

Who knew that indexes could be so political and cause so much controversy? It shouldn't surprise me, of course. Gathering and presenting data is not a neutral act.

Thanks to NetGalley for the review copy. The book comes out later in 2021.