Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

The merit of Gibbon's masterpiece needs no defense. Readers are, I assume, looking for remarks about whether this Everyman set is a quality edition. Well, this is it. I looked at the Folio Society edition: lovely, yes; but fragile and grossly overpriced. The Everyman is sturdily bound with solid boards and paper. The typeface is clean. A handy bookmark is bound into each volume. It's nice to hold in the hand. The text is the standard one of 1910, with notes to catch major errors of fact; there are good, more recent introductions (to vols 1 and 4) by the eminent Hugh Trevor-Roper (does that man know everything, or what?). ALL of the original footnotes are here, and readers of Gibbon should consider them as essential. Someone once quipped that Gibbon lived out his sex life in footnotes; there's some truth in that remark. Reading Gibbon is a landmark achievement in a person's life. Spend it with the quality production of this Everyman set.