AT HOME

Months ago, I was searching for Bill Bryson audiobooks in the library catalog when I came across the entry for his forthcoming book, At Home: A Short History of Private Life. As soon as I saw the title, I knew that, as a consummate homebody, I had to read it. I put it on hold instantly and when it came out, I was the first library patron to get a copy. But I was in the midst of reading something else at the time, and At Home is not as brief as its title promises, and with one thing and another I didn’t finish it by the time it was due (and I couldn’t renew it because there was a waiting list of other people who had it on hold). By this time, of course, I was thoroughly enjoying it, but I reluctantly wrote down the page number I was on, returned the book to the library, and placed a new hold—only to find that now there were more than 50 people ahead of me on the hold list. Luckily, my friend M happened to mention At Home in conversation, prompting me to pour forth my woes to her, after which she very thoughtfully bought it for me for Christmas, and at last I was able to finish it.

All of this is to say that I had to read this book in fits and starts, but it’s a good book to read that way. At Home is reminiscent of A Short History of Nearly Everything in its quirky-informative tone, but here Bryson turns his omnivorous attention from science to social history. He uses his house, a Victorian parsonage in rural England, as a rough organizing principle for his explorations, focusing each chapter on a different room—so that the “Kitchen” chapter discusses the story of the spice trade, the “Scullery” chapter domestic servitude, the “Bedroom” chapter sexual practices and medicine, etc.—and mainly limits his study to England (and some of America) in the last 150 years or so, but in reality this is a miscellaneous compendium that meanders across a huge range of subjects at the author’s whim. I happen to like that sort of thing, at least when it’s chock full of historical trivia and written in Bryson’s witty, always enthusiastic style, but your mileage may vary. I just love the nifty interconnections of history, the way large-scale events can have repercussions in the smallest of everyday items, and Bryson does a good job of elucidating them. For me, the most cohesive, interesting, and memorable part was the section in which he outlines the history of the very concept of houses, their accompanying domestic comforts, and the very idea of privacy. Beyond that, I will admit to having forgotten* most of the wealth of information on a myriad of subjects that Bryson throws his readers’ way, but at least that means that this will make an equally enjoyable reread in a few years.

*In fact, just the other day, A was telling me about some “Weird Weapons of WWII” show he’d watched on the History Channel about how the U.S. tried to strap tiny explosives to bats, and it sounded like something I’d read about really recently, but I couldn’t imagine where. It was driving me so crazy, I actually had to get out the list of all the books I’ve read in the past few months and look for likely candidates. Since I haven’t been reading much nonfiction lately, I quickly narrowed it down to either Packing for Mars or At Home, although I couldn’t quite see how either of them got around to the topic of WWII weaponry. Fortunately, At Home has an index, and amazingly, there was an entry for “Bats,” and sure enough, there were several paragraphs on the bat-bomb project. So as you can see, this book ranges fairly far afield from its stated subject.