The Book Nobody Read: Chasing the Revolutions of Nicolaus Copernicus

Review: "In the spring of 1543, as astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus lay on his deathbed, his fellow clerics brought him a long-awaited package: the final printed pages of the book he had worked on for many years, De revolutionibus (On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres). Though Copernicus would not live to hear of its extraordinary impact, his book, which first suggested that the Sun, not the Earth, is the center of the universe, is recognized as one of the most influential scientific works of all time - thanks in part to astro-physicist Owen Gingerich." "Four and a half centuries after its initial publication, Gingerich embarked on an epic quest to see in person all existing copies of the first and second editions. He was inspired by a seeming contradiction: Arthur Koestler's claim, in his book The Sleepwalkers, that nobody had read Copernicus's famous book when it was published; and Gingerich's discovery, in Edinburgh, of a first edition richly annotated in the margins by the leading teacher of astronomy in Eu