The Story of Writing – Book Review
Alphabets, Hieroglyphs & Pictograms Explored by Andrew Robinson
Jun 9, 2009
The Story of Writing was first published by Thames & Hudson in 1995 and is as much about the history of writing as it is about writing as an art form.
This latest edition (Thames & Hudson, 2007) includes the results of new research and discoveries that impact directly on the history of writing. The 232-page publication features more than 350 illustrations, of which 50 are in colour.
The Story of Writing – What Can Readers Expect?
The author, Andrew Robinson, looks at the links between sounds, symbols, pictures and script. He explores the world's major writing systems including cuneiform, Egyptian and Mayan hieroglyphs and the scripts of Japan and China. Robinson relates the history of decipherment and also provides a thought provoking discussion of undeciphered scripts.
Robinson makes it clear from the outset that no one person could have the necessary expertise to discuss all the writing systems covered in this publication. Therefore, he has drawn upon the knowledge of leading experts including John Chadwick, author of Linear B and Related Scripts, Michael Coe, author of Breaking The Maya Code and John DeFrancis, author of The Chinese Language.
Robinson has tried to present their arguments faithfully. He stresses, unusually for any author, that any misrepresentation is accidental and solely his responsibility.
The Story of Writing – the Structure of the Book
In his Introduction Andrew Robinson poses a number of questions:
- How did our ancestors learn to write?
- What kind of people were the early writers?
- What information, ideas and feelings did they record?
- How did their symbols record their speech and thoughts?
- How are these symbols to be deciphered today?
- Do today's writing systems work in a completely different way to those of 5000 years ago?
- Are Chinese and Japanese scripts like ancient hieroglyphs?
- Do hieroglyphs have advantages over alphabets?
In answering these questions Robinson looks at cultures and languages from all periods of human existence. He explores ancient and modern scripts, as well as medieval manuscripts, calligraphy, typography and printing. However, this book does not chart the chronological development of writing nor does it attempt to explore every conceivable system, past or present, because there are simply too many to mention.
The book is divided into three main sections:
How Writing Works
This section looks at ideas central to the history of writing, including:
- The Rosetta Stone, and the work of Jean-François Champollion (1790-1832) in deciphering its secrets.
- Visible and invisible writing.
- Sign language.
- The classification of writing systems.
- The prestige of scripts – in Japan the writing system based on Chinese characters remains highly revered and no one would contemplate radical changes to the system.
Extinct Writing
The second section examines a number of systems in detail:
- Cuneiform as both art and craft.
- Hieroglyphs and the development of Egyptian writing.
- Linear Script of Class B. Archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans (1851-1941) discovered clay tablets inscribed with a text that bore no relationship to Egyptian hieroglyphs, Sumerian cuneiform or the Greek alphabet. He named it "Linear Script of Class B" and spent forty years trying to decipher it, without success.
- The work of Michael Ventris (1922-1956) who successfully unravelled Linear Script of Class B.
- The Mayan culture and writing system and the work of Yuri Valentinovich Knorosov (1922-1999) in deciphering Mayan glyphs.
- The Phaistos Disc described by Robinson as 'the greatest puzzle among the scripts of ancient Crete'.
Living Writing
Robinson looks at a number of writing systems to assess how and why scripts survive:
- Greek and Latin letters.
- Hebrew and Aramaic scripts.
- Indian scripts.
- The Cherokee writing system.
- The Development of Japanese and Chinese Characters.
- Japanese and Chinese calligraphy.
- Computerisation of writing systems.
Andrew Robinson – About the Author
Andrew Robinson, previously Literary Editor of The Times Higher Education Supplement (1994-2006), is author of more than 15 books including: The Man Who Deciphered Linear B: The Story of Michael Ventris, (Thames & Hudson, 2002) and Lost Languages: The Enigma of the World's Great Undeciphered Scripts, (McGraw-Hill, 2002).
The Story of Writing is a fascinating and easy to read introduction to the history of writing through the centuries. Published by Thames & Hudson, it is priced at £11.95. ISBN 978-0500286609.
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