THIS WEEK'S BOOKS
THERE is not much worthy of notice among this week's publications. Dr. Ivor B. Hart has written a treatise on The Mechanical Investigations of Leonardo da Vinci (Chapman and Hall). He begins quietly and unemphatically :- "Leonardo da Vinci was a great man " : he was more ; he was one of the most astonishing men in the world's history. Not content with being an artist as great as Michael Angelo, he was also encyclopaedic as scientist and philosopher. His invention was so rapid and continuous that he had no time for writing theses ; all went into his note-books. He wrote mirror-fashion, with his left hand ; and he used a great number of private abbreviations : the work of deciphering his note-books is therefore difficult. But, as Dr. Hart says, they form " a vast scientific scrap-heap from which has been salved clear proofs of an ingenuity and a capacity for original thinking which alone would suffice to place him in the fore- front of the world's greatest thinkers." The book is mainly a study of Leonardo's contribution to aeronautics.
Previous page
