I greatly enjoyed reading this book. While the book touches on, at various points, the story surrounding the creation and printing of the various copies of the "Gutenberg Bible," the actual focus is on one particular copy, the copy that is known to scholars as "Number 45" from a catalogue of surviving copies made by one 19th century scholar. The author traces the history of the copy from the early 19th century to the present day. (The book's title is somewhat misleading, in that we aren't told anything about the copy's history prior to about 1825.) The two century odyssey -- and that's a good use of that word -- is quite fascinating, as we get a good look at the individuals that owned it. The widow of oil baron Edward Dohney gets the most coverage, possibly because her story is the best documented. And the end of her saga, after her death, is probably the most enraging, with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles fumbling it away. It is noteworthy how much bad luck and tragedy seems to attach to this copy. The author clearly had a good time writing this book, and it shows. For book-lovers, a highly enjoyable read. ( )

This is the second book I've read this year regarding book collecting and collectors, and it was just as fascinating as the The Millionaire and the Bard, which I read first. The history of the Gutenberg bible and early printing is so interesting, and as I was reading, I thought a lot about another book I read a year or so ago, The Book: A Cover-to-Cover Exploration of the Most Powerful Object of Our Time, which I highly recommend to people who enjoyed this book.

I wish the author hadn't chosen to write about this history in the present tense. I never got used to it, and it irritated and distracted me enough to knock down my rating. I don't know if the choice was to make it all sound more exciting, like someone breathlessly telling a story and painting a picture, but I didn't love it, and I wanted it to stop. Maybe that's picky, but I've been reading for almost 50 years now, and I have my crotchets. It doesn't keep me from recommending this book, because it had a lot of great, well-researched content for people interested in the subject. ( )

The subtitle is a tad hyperbolic. The narrative tells us nothing of the first several hundred years, but for the latter span the story is most interesting and well told. ( )

Though Margaret Leslie Davis's book is centered around a copy of the famous Gutenberg Bible (designated Number 45), it's really about the people who have sought, owned, and studied it over the course of two centuries. After a short description of the book's origins in the 15th century, she picks up the story with Archibald Acheson, 3rd Earl of Gosford, who purchases the book in 1836. While her reasons for starting with him go largely unmentioned (she does reference the book's previous owner, a Henry Perkins), the earl's purchase occurred at a time when the rare book market had emerged and copies of such books were increasingly prized by the growing group of collectors. As Davis notes, though, the Gutenberg was initially not as greatly valued as other works, with the earl acquiring his prize for a surprisingly modest sum.

That would change over the course of the 19th century, as the Gutenberg Bible became increasingly prized for its beauty, its rarity, and its historical significance. Davis charts this development through a succession of owners, from the earl through Lord William Tyssen-Amherst (who added the volume to his collection in 1884) to Charles William Dyson Perrins (a condiment manufacturer) before the book's eventual purchase by the wife of an American oil tycoon, Estelle Doheny, in 1950. As she traces the course of its ownership, she describes the motivations of each collector, their various views of the Bible, and their treatment of the book, all of which she makes engaging with a fine appreciation for engaging details. The increasing reverence in which the book is held is perhaps best embodied by Doheny, who upon her death donated it and the rest of her extensive collection to St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, California. This is where Davis tells what is perhaps the most tragic part of the book's tale, for upon the expiration of the restriction on Doheny's donation the Roman Catholic Church sold the Bible along with most of the other books and artwork she gifted them.

Today the Gutenberg Davis describes resides in a vault at Keio University in Japan, where it remains physically inaccessible to the public. Yet Davis ends the book on a surprisingly optimistic note, as she describes how, thanks to digitization efforts, anyone on the Internet today can read Number 45 for themselves, as digital scans of it are online at http://dcollections.lib.keio.ac.jp/en/gutenberg. Hopefully Davis's book will encourage more people to visit the site to see this historical treasure for themselves, especially given the winding journey it took to go from closeted collections to readability by the world. ( )

The author appreciates the appreciation held by only one of the five private owners of the Gutenberg Bible designated Number 45, viz., Estelle Doheny. Doheny appreciated it for all the right reasons - its rarity, beauty and impact on history. So Margaret Davis expends most of the pages of her book to Ms. Doheny’s connection to Number 45, including the first chapter and the middle hundred pages. That’s due in large part to the fact that the preponderance of source material comes from the two librarians who nurtured the treasure after Doheny acquired it.

Private ownership became possible in 1836 in England after Napoleon “requisitioned” (p. 22) books like Number 45 which had been secreted in the libraries of European aristocrats and monasteries for centuries. Archibald Acheson, Earl of Gosford “first” purchased it from a collector named Spencer who bought it from a collector named Henry Perkins. Davis does not include these later two collectors in the list of five who owned Number 45, nor does she trace the ownership prior to Perkins.

Margaret Davis does manage to make the life of Gutenberg number 45 as intriguing as a rarified player in the circle of bibliomaniacs. And in doing so, she manages to make the point that the mystique surrounding books like Number 45 is deserved. These tomes deserve respect, even by us non-maniacs.

Number 45 is no longer available for viewing by anyone; not even by the most qualified scholars. It is entombed in a vault. But it can be viewed online: http://dcollections.lib.keio.ac.jp/en/gutenberg. ( )