Bill Bryson and his family live in a part of England where nothing of any great significance has happened since the Romans decamped. One day, he began to consider how little he knew about the ordinary things of life as he found it in that comfortable home. To remedy this, he formed the idea of journeying about his house from room to room to "write a history of the world without leaving home."
The bathroom provides for a history of hygiene; the bedroom, for sex, death, and sleep; the kitchen, for nutrition and the spice trade; and so on, as Bryson shows how each has figured in the evolution of private life. Whatever happens in the world, he demonstrates, ends up in our house, in the paint and the pipes and the pillows and every item of furniture. Book signing to follow.
Speakers in sequence:
* Esther Foer (Sixth and I),
* Lissa Muscatine (Politics and Prose), and
* Bill Bryson
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