Euclid's Elements

To the first; this is a no-glue sturdy edition - happy to be photocopied - with all of the books bound in one nice portable volume. Despite being reasonably compact, there is ample space on every page for notes, and the diagrams are large and clear. It's really good.

To the second;THIS IS THE BEST BOOK EVER WRITTEN BY A HUMAN. I'm not kidding and I'm not exaggerating; there is no way to express the joy of reading Euclid without sounding like a lunatic. There are very few books which reach their umpteenth thousandth edition without promising a posthumous infinity of bliss. The bliss of 'The Elements' is admittedly finite, but it delivers right away. This is an electrifying piece of work which has produced a chorus of rapture and inspiration lasting two millennia. Poets have penned homage to its beauty. Philosophers and mathematicians have wept. Theologians saw God in its perfection. As war, pestilence and plague tortured humanity, as the empires of despots rose and crumbled, the devout risked death rather than surrender this book. Why? Because they had read it.

It is a cure for math-phobia, and can be read by anyone who is at least a little studious and over the age of 12.


THE BEST edition available to date.   October 25, 2005
Kersi Von Zerububbel (San Diego, CA USA)
49 out of 49 found this review helpful

This edition of Elements put out by a publisher called Greenlion is superb. The font size, text layout, figures adjacent to propositions, and wide margins make this book very convenient to follow the logic behind each proposition. I used to own the three volume edition put out by Dover but this one beats it by leaps and bounds.

Of course Euclid's Elements, to my mind, ranks as one of the majesterial achievements of the human mind. I follow the format of one proposition a week till I complete the cycle. Then take a respite for a year or two and repeat the exercise.

In 1963 during a train journey from Bangalore to Bombay (via.Poona), India, I was reading Dr. Radhakrishnan's Indian Philosophy. Upon noticing this an elderly gentleman admonished me to stop wasting time and go with something he called "the great Eee-u-clid's ideas". He then gave me one of the best lectures in Western Philosophy that I can remember. Euclid, he said, is far more than geometry. This was my introduction to Euclid other than High School geometry. This gentleman told me that he had written down each propositon and proof from volumes available at the goverment Public Library in Cubbon Park, Bangalore. He was a clerk at the library who had no formal education. Everytime I open the Elements I think of Mr. Gururaj. Such is the beauty and power of Euclid.


A Truly Fitting Vehicle for this Masterpiece of Greek Wisdom   March 12, 2007
tepi
31 out of 31 found this review helpful

Euclid's Elements: all thirteen books complete in one volume. The Thomas L. Heath Translation. Dana Densmore, Editor. Santa Fe, New Mexico: Green Lion Press, 2002. Cloth, 529 pp. ISBN 1888009187.

I have just received my hardcover copy of 'Euclid's Elements' and must say that Green Lion Press is to be congratulated on having given us, not only an accurate and uncluttered student-friendly edition of Euclid, but a book that in terms of its physical makeup is truly splendid.

What a striking contrast this Green Lion Press book is to the over-priced trash so many publishers see fit to inflict on us today. Rather than the sort of pseudo-book we have grown accustomed to - books on paper of mediocre quality in imitation cloth-covered boards; books with those wretched thermoplastic spines that either won't open flat or if opened will immediately crack; books designed to self-destruct after only minimal use - Green Lion Press has given us something very different.

Their hardcover edition is cased in sturdy real cloth-covered boards. Its pages are Smyth-sewn in the traditional manner so that the book will open flat. It is beautifully printed on durable high-quality paper and the typography and layout are also excellent.

Green Lion Press has, in short, given us A REAL BOOK at a reasonable price, one that will easily withstand the heavy use most readers will be giving it, and one that is a truly fitting vehicle for this masterpiece of Greek wisdom.



Excelent edition   November 13, 2005
Javier Mgica De Rivera (Spain)
30 out of 31 found this review helpful

There are a few books one would like to give six stars, and above all of them there is this ten star book. As everyting has been said about The Elements, I would review this particular edition rather than The Elements itself.

First of all, this is a one single volume (be aware of Dover's 10$ book, it is only one thrid of the whole). This is usefull, of course, but to me it adquires an extra relevance in this particular item. The Elements may be the best math book ever (including Newton's Principia), so I just didn't want a book, but a beautifull book. This is the only time I chose the hardcover edition, and I think I did right. The book is printed in high quality paper, and the typeface is also beautifull.

As someone has already said, when you are reading through a proposition, and you turn the page, you find the diagram repeated, so that you don't have to be continually back and forth. In this book, where every propositions includes a diagram, this is not a minor advantage.

The final pro is that it is not interspersed with Heath's notes. "Euclid Alone has looked on beauty bare", so you better take this edition rather than the Dover's one. The book can be followed from the first proposition til the very last one, so no coments should be interspersed. Any critical notes about the propositions should be either at the end of each of Euclid's books, or if they are very extense, as Heath's ones, in a separated volume. To understanding The Elements, this edition prefaces suffice (and I even think that some parts are unnecesary, sometimes becoming redundant).

Green Lion Press has done a good job in providing us this beautifull one-volume edition.


Great Edition of a Great Book   September 20, 2005
James Layne (Thomas Aquinas College, Santa Paula, Ca)
22 out of 22 found this review helpful

This edition of Euclid's Elements is a very commonly used one at Thomas Aquinas College in California, a school where the Elements is a required course. We begin study of the Elements in the freshman year and continue to explore its meaning in later mathematics and philosophy.

This ancient work is a masterpiece of the human mind and a marvelous example of how a science may be built off of proper beginning principles. This edition presents an excellent translation of that work in a quality binding. Many evenings (and some late nights) I poured through its pages, hands covered with chalk as I prepared to be able to present his propositions in class. The binding withstood all of my wear and tear (this is saying a great deal).

One of the most important features of this edition of Euclid is the fact that the diagrams are reprinted on additional pages so that one may see them as he studies the texts of the various propositions. There is no need to constantly flip back and forth to look at diagrams (an important part of following the flow of the argument in the proposition for most students). Most other printings of the Elements (at least the ones that I have seen) lack this very helpful feature. The pages are also large enough to add some notes while working through the props.

Quite simply, this is a great edition of one of the greatest masterpieces of the human mind. No lover of geometry, of mathematics, or of truth in general, should be without this or some other faithful translation of this foundational text.