Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society » Rotary Reading Desk
In 1588, the Italian Engineer Agostino Ramelli described a novel invention to facilitate the reading of multiple books at once:
A beautiful and ingenious machine, which is very useful and convenient to every person who takes pleasure in study, especially those who are suffering from indisposition or are subject to gout: for with this sort of machine a man can see and read a great quantity of books, without moving his place: besides, it has this fine convenience, which is, of occupying a little space in the place where it is set, as any person of understanding can appreciate from the drawing.
The machine makes an appearance in Richard Lester’s 1974 film The Three Musketeers, and is described in A History of Reading by Alberto Manguel.
* Another invention to make reading easier: Lying Down Glasses.
