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Title: No Idle Hands : The Social History of American Knitting by Anne Macdonald ISBN: 0-345-36253-5 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 07 April, 1990 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $25.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.33 (6 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: One of my favorite books
Comment: Reading the reviews, I can understand why a non-knitter would not be charmed by this book. This book is by, for and about knitters. Whenever I'm bogged down with my knitting, I pick this book up again, seeking inspiration from 200 years of American knitters. The book is delightfully written, with lots of original source quotations, and allows us to peek into the day-to-day lives of colonial knitters, revolutionary war knitters, civil war knitters, depression era knitters, etc. It gives one a strong sense of women's role in American society at different times, reminds us (often amusingly) about fads and trends, and shows how wars shape lives beyond the battlefields. It's a wonderful book. My only regret is that it doesn't have more photographs of knitters and old knit garments.
Rating: 5
Summary: Women-Unsung Heroes with their Needles
Comment: I originally borrowed the above book from my knitting teacher and thought to myself I would love to have this in my collection of craft books etc.
That was about five years ago before I even dreamed about a pc computer no less used Amazon[.com] books. So I have been living my fantasy buying all my dream books.
About the book. Many references to people, places and things.
I was fascinated by a knitted baby blanked called a Remsen Quilt originated with the World Church Services. To make a long story short I tracked down the woman they wrote about in a nursing home in Conn. and she wrote me a lovely letter. She had no idea where the name came from but they knitted themselves into oblivion for charity.
So if after all that time I am still thinking about that book It must be a good one. Happy to say I ordered it used today.
Mary Young, New Hampshire
Rating: 2
Summary: More quaint knitting lore than social history
Comment: I would have given this book two and a half stars if I could have. It's not bad, but it's of much more interest to knitters than anyone who is looking for social history. For one thing, it fairly often goes into details about knitting that a nonknitter or even a beginning knitter wouldn't get. For another, the author often seems more interested in quaint period detail than in history.
For the most part, this book just enumerates what women knitted in each period of history. It gets repetitive, especially when it comes to the wartime knitting. The story is pretty much the same during each war: Women got together in societies and knit tons and tons of socks.
She obviously did quite a bit of research, but doesn't draw many conclusions or put the information together in a compelling way. She piles on a lot of repetitive detail long after her point is made.
I can see why some people thought this was a good read. Her writing style is conversational and informal, gossipy at times. But I found it tiresome. She likes to "overuse" "quotes." She also writes almost entirely in loooonnnng sentences with a million clauses so that by the end of the sentence you forget what she was trying to say. Sometimes she even forgets to end the sentence.
I'm looking forward to reading The Age of Homespun by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich. Her work also includes a lot of repetitive detail and tends to be dry, but she usually unearths some interesting facts and draws noteworthy conculsions.
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Title: A History of Hand Knitting by Richard Rutt ISBN: 1931499373 Publisher: Interweave Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 2003 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
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Title: The Knitting Experience: The Purl Stitch (Knitting Experience Series, Book 2) by Sally Melville, Alexis Xenakis ISBN: 1893762149 Publisher: XRX Books Pub. Date: 01 October, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Stitch 'N Bitch: The Knitter's Handbook by Debbie Stoller ISBN: 0761128182 Publisher: Workman Publishing Company Pub. Date: October, 2003 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Knitting into the Mystery: A Guide to the Shawl-Knitting Ministry by Susan S. Izard, Susan S. Jorgensen ISBN: 0819219673 Publisher: Morehouse Publishing Pub. Date: October, 2003 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Arans & Celtics: The Best of Knitter's Magazine (The Best of Knitter's Magazine series) by XRX Books, Alexis Xenakis, Rick Mondragon ISBN: 189376205X Publisher: XRX Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 2003 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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