Rybczynski, Witold. Home: A Short History of an Idea. New York, NY: Viking, 1986.
In Home: A Short History of an Idea, Witold Rybczynski develops a definition of comfort. Using a variety of sources including paintings by Vermeer and the writings of Jane Austen and Catherine Beecher, he traces with great detail the history of the home and family from the middle ages to the present, seeking to discover a broad meaning of comfort over time. By the end of the book, Rybczynski declares that comfort is both objective and subjective and it encompasses the following important features: privacy, intimacy, domesticity, coziness, convenience and ease. He calls his definition the Onion Theory of Comfort: the onion looks deceivingly simple, yet it is composed of many delicate and transparent layers. So, too, the meaning of comfort: it is simple to know when you are comfortable, but it is hard to explain all the possible reasons why you are comfortable. [M. Murphy]