The Greatest Invention

Brisk, simple to follow and unfussy – though the author has a way with a helpful metaphor, for which we non-experts are grateful. Only occasionally does it turn complicated; but this is where much of the fun is to be found [ … ] Ferrara’s book is an introduction to writing as a process of revelation, but it’s also a celebration of these things still undeciphered, and many other tantalising mysteries besides. – Daniel Hahn * Spectator *In Silvia Ferrara’s conception of it, writing is a fragile object, nurtured over many phases of human development … The Greatest Invention is a celebration not of achievements, but of moments of illumination and ‘the most important thing in the world: our desire to be understood.’ – Lydia Wilson * The Times Literary Supplement *Ferrara says she wrote the book the way she talks to friends over dinner, and that’s exactly how it reads. Instead of telling a chronological history of writing, she moves freely from script to script, island to island … She is constantly by our side, prodding us with questions, offering speculations, reporting on exciting discoveries … . her book doubles as a manifesto for collaborative research. – Martin Puchner * The New York Times Book Review *

[An] intellectually stimulating, chattily written survey of the invention and significance of writing in both the ancient and modern world.

Silvia Ferrara is a Professor of Aegean civilization at the University of Bologna. She studied at University College London and the University of Oxford and, after several years as a researcher in Archeology and Linguistics at Oxford, she returned to Italy. She has taught at University College London, the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge and the Sapienza University of Rome.