Nothing Is so Fragile as a Book

Opinions About Books Are Every Bit as Powerful as Those Within Them. Reviewing ‘The Library’ by Andrew Pettegree and Arthur der Weduwen

While everyone agrees it was the most ambitious collection of books in the ancient world, nobody knows the true size of the Library of Alexandria. Scholars say as many as 200,000 scrolls, maybe half a million. Nor do we know how it was ultimately destroyed: fire is the usual suspect, though who set the blazes and when are open to debate. 

It turns out, h…