Every Book Its Reader: The Power of the Printed Word to Stir the World

Offers an engaging consideration of writings that have "made things happen" in the world - works that have both nudged the course of history and fired the imagination of countless influential people such as John Milton, Isaac Newton, Frederick Douglass, Henry James, Helen Keller, and even the notorious Marquis de Sade and Adolf Hitler. Basbanes also profiles the most articulate readers of our own time - including Harold Bloom, Robert Fagles, Helen Vendler, and Elaine Pagels - and offers insightful discussions of literary canons and classic works in translation as well as powerful exhortations on the ability of literature to train physicians, nurture children, and rehabilitate criminal offenders.