The Book Nobody Read: Chasing the Revolutions of Nicolaus Copernicus.

In a book titled The Sleepwalkers, Arthur Koestler declared that Nicolaus Copernicus' landmark tome On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres was a book that nobody read when it was published in 1543. This was the text in which Copernicus postulated the revolutionary notion that Earth isn't the center of the universe--a theory that would eventually rank him among the most influential scientists of all time. After coming across a heavily annotated first edition of the book in Edinburgh, Gingerich began to doubt Koestler's assertion. The copy had been marked by one of Copernicus' contemporaries, astronomer Erasmus Reinhold. Gingerich, a professor of science history at Harvard University, spent the next 30 years tracking down every other copy he could find. Here he shares the story of his journey around the world in search of these volumes. Among the 601 that he collected, he finds books with notations by scientists who were Copernicus' contemporaries, clearly indicating that the cosmic place of Earth was already being debated and discussed at that time. Gingerich finds that copies were once on the shelves of such people as John Maynard Keynes and Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, as well as King George II of England and the philosopher Giordano Bruno. Gingerich's long mission has yielded a book that supports Copernicus' forty place in history and offers an unusual look at the development of astronomy. Walker, 2004, 306 p., color plates/b&w photos/illus., hardcover, $25.00.