Edward Tuft created a wonderful book. It is filled with pictoral displays covering dozens of examples throughout that past few centuries. With that intro, you can imagine he covers a lot of ground. Tuft has an easy-going style that makes the book engaging and fun to read. The examples are always eye opening and made me aware of how we often gloss over the visual impact of what we see in print. I loved everything about the book and am happy to own it. The reader/buyer should be aware that this is not a tutorial or any kind of "how-to". It is more of a "see what was done" throught history and go hmmmm...As Tuft teaches at Yale, the style makes sense. One can pick up the book and read for 15 mins, then pick it up again next week. A great coffee table book with pictures!
This book reveals alternatives in graphing, and thus thinking, showing the concept of most graphing is only in last few centuries- and many very powerful means of relaying real information into monstrously leveraged state that are little seen now. One graphic near wordlessly reveals hundreds of thousands of men going to battle, and a few tens or thousands returning, where they fell. Another is a USA graphic of counties with cancer, men, women, and so telling, much more so than I thought possible- WITHOUT CONCLUSIONS- I can draw those myself. Over time humans are tending to think like one herd, for the interested, this book can be enjoyed, savored, even read!! (I know!! {Shudder} :) Summary: If you found it, it's what you hope and plenty of it. Mike
I bought this book for a class in college. I've only used it once and that was for an open book test. After having scanned the material lightly, I've noticed that the text is not very interesting (though the title would sway me otherwise?) and comes off rather bland. It is, however, very informative when it comes to how to properly display graphs, charts, and the like. I would certainly not recommend this book for casual reading, but I would recommend it for somebody who is doing research about the use of graphs, charts, and pictures.
Top notch
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: Pre-owned
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: Pre-owned
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