The Notebook

A History of Thinking on Paper: A New Statesman and Spectator Book of the Year

Roland Allen

• Publisher: Profile Books
• Year: 2023
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781782839156
• Subtopic: Social History
• Index: History

A New Yorker Book of the Year 2024

A Ryan Holiday '(Very) Best Book I Read in 2024'

'Excellent' Ian Samson, TLS

'From plans for flying machines to philosophy - the remarkable joy of jotting things down' Guardian

'Surprisingly revealing' The Sunday Times

We see notebooks everywhere we go. But where did this simple invention come from? How did they revolutionise our lives, and why are they such powerful tools for creativity? And how can using a notebook help you change the way you think?

In this wide-ranging story, Roland Allen reveals all the answers. Ranging from the bustling markets of medieval Florence to the quiet studies of our greatest thinkers, he follows a trail of dazzling ideas, revealing how the notebook became our most dependable and versatile tool for creative thinking. He tells the notebook stories of artists like Leonardo and Frida Kahlo, scientists from Isaac Newton to Marie Curie, and writers from Chaucer to Henry James. We watch Darwin developing his theory of evolution in tiny pocketbooks, see Agatha Christie plotting a hundred murders in scrappy exercise books, and learn how Bruce Chatwin unwittingly inspired the creation of the Moleskine.

On the way we meet a host of cooks, kings, sailors, fishermen, musicians, engineers, politicians, adventurers and mathematicians, who all used their notebooks as a space for thinking and to shape the modern world.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise for The Notebook
• Copyright Page
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Introduction
• Chapter 1: Before notebooks: The Mediterranean 1000 BCE–1250 CE
• Chapter 2: Red book, white book, cloth book: The invention of accounting, Provence and Florence 1299
• Chapter 3: Slight strokes in a little book: The sketchbook, Florence 1300–1500
• Chapter 4: Ricordi, ricordanzi, zibaldoni: Notebooks in the home, Florence 1300–1500
• Chapter 5: Pepper in Alexandria: The Book of Michael of Rhodes, Venice 1434
• Chapter 6: Wicked wives and and mouths stopped with wool: The notebook comes to England, 1372–1517
• Chapter 7: The long life of LHD 244: Singing in harmony, Bologna c.1450–1600
• Chapter 8: ‘Alas, this will never get anything done…’: Two notebook-keepers, Italy 1455–1519
• Chapter 9: O the pains and labour to record what other people have said!: Common-place books, 1512–present
• Chapter 10: From one mouth to the other runs East and West: The world ocean, 1519–1522
• Chapter 11: King of the herring: Fishbook, The Netherlands 1570
• Chapter 12: A dull Dutch fashion: Friendship books, northern Europe 1645
• Chapter 13: Several gems: Industrial observations, Germany 1598
• Chapter 14: Let him not stay long: Travellers and their notebooks, 1470–present
• Chapter 15: The Waste Book: Mathematics, Lincolnshire 1612
• Chapter 16: A tale of two notebooks: Fouquet and Colbert, Paris 1661–80
• Chapter 17: But 18 pence in money; and a table-book: Table-books, England and the Netherlands 1520s–1670s
• Chapter 18: Albetrosses: Logged journey, London to Amoy 1699
• Chapter 19: I think: Naturalists’ notebooks, 1551–1859
• Chapter 20: One way to immortality: Diaries and journals, 1600–present
• Chapter 21: You’re spot on: Police notebooks, 1829–present
• Chapter 22: Yes, better if dentist is dead: Authors’ notebooks, 1894–present
• Chapter 23: Preserving and Coockery: Recipe books, 1639–present
• Chapter 24: Express yourself: Journaling as self-care, 1968–present
• Chapter 25: Blue, green, red, yellow: Electioneering, Florida 1977–2003
• Chapter 26: Non-trivial: Climate logs, 1850s–present
• Chapter 27: Attention deficit: Bullet journaling, Brooklyn 2010
• Chapter 28: In search of lost time: Patient diaries, 1952–present
• Chapter 29: Egodocuments: Notebook studies, 1883–present
• Chapter 30: A different part of the brain: Observing artists, 2022
• Conclusion: Otto carries a notebook: The extended mind, 1938–present
• Appendix: Notes and references
• Appendix: Image credits
• Acknowledgements
• Index
• About the Author