-
Your next favorite book
is waiting.
Of Humans and War
by Alessandro Sanna
From acclaimed Italian artist Alessandro Sanna, a sweeping history of war and humanity as told wordlessly through paintings—tracing both human destruction and creation through the ages, as witnessed and recorded by stone.
A stone falls to the Earth. It picks up speed, rolling down the steep side of a mountain until it comes to rest in an empty plain. But the plain won't remain empty for long: out of the shadows emerge two figures, who immediately start to grapple, using that very stone as a weapon to kill.
But those same hands, our human hands, holding the same weight of stone, also shape and forge, chisel and build, creating as they destroy, rendering beauty and violence alike. What is the relationship of those twin impulses? In these pages, artist Alessandaro Sanna uses the shaping force of his hands to explore the seemingly endless, perversely steadfast human capacity for destruction. Unflinchingly tracing humanity's long history of war, from the havoc of armies on horseback, to the violence of the conquistadores, to the carnage of the First World War, to the ghastly terror of the atomic bomb, and the cruel, shockingly intentional attack on the Twin Towers, Sanna records our compulsion to destroy. The hands mold clay, streak color across a sky, define a world, give beauty to the eye; and yet fires burn, an acrid smell arises, smoke blots out the sun. For what and why?
"In this translated work, an Italian artist grapples with the intractability of war as part of the human condition...Readers witness an increasing scale and scope of conflict and violence through illustrations that at times feel universal and at others reference iconic, recognizable scenes from diverse times and places...Painterly, atmospheric backgrounds add perspective and a stark elegance, accentuating the bleak solemnity. The montaged compositions occasionally evoke Peter Sis' art and Shaun Tan's The Arrival. A haunting, poetic visual interpretation of one of humanity's existential dilemmas." ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
This information about Old As Stone, Hard As Rock was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Born in 1975, Alessandro Sanna is considered one of Italy's leading contemporary illustrators. He has earned wide recognition across Europe as an illustrator and author, and his work has appeared in the New York Times Book Review and The New Yorker. He is a prolific and popular creator of illustrated books for children and readers of all ages, including The River, Pinocchio: The Origin Story, and Crescendo, and has received many awards and had many exhibitions. He lives and works in Mantua, Italy.
If you liked Old As Stone, Hard As Rock, try these:
by Ferdia Lennon
Published 2025
An utterly original celebration of that which binds humanity across battle lines and history.
by Catherine Lacey
Published 2024
From one of our fiercest stylists, a roaring epic chronicling the life, times, and secrets of a notorious artist.
by Judith Schalansky
Published 2021
Each disparate object described in this book - a Caspar David Friedrich painting, a species of tiger, a villa in Rome, a Greek love poem, an island in the Pacific - shares a common fate: it no longer exists, except as the dead end of a paper trail.
Beware the man of one book
Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!
Can you name the title?
Test your book knowledge with our daily trivia challenge!
Your guide toexceptional books
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.
