Originally published: Harmondsworth : Penguin Books, 1978.

The structure in our lives - or how to communicate with engineers -- pt. I. The difficult birth of the science of elasticity. why structures carry loads - or the springiness of solids ; The invention of stress and strain - or Baron Cauchy and the decipherment of Young's modulus ; Designing for safety - or can you really trust strength calculations? ; Strain energy and modern fracture mechanics - with a digression on bows, catapults and kangaroos -- pt. II. Tension structures. Tension structures and pressure vessels - with some remarks on boilers, bats and Chinese junks ; Joints, fastenings and people - also about creep and chariot wheels ; Soft materials and living structures - or how to design a worm -- pt. III. Compression and bending structures. Walls, arches and dams - or cloud-capp'd towers and the stability of masonry ; Something about bridges - or Saint Bénexèt and Saint Isambard ; The advantage of being a beam - with observations on roofs, trusses and masts ; The mysteries of shear and torsion - or Polaris and the bias-cut nightie ; The various ways of failing in compression - or sandwiches, skulls and Dr. Euler -- pt. IV. And the consequence was . . . the philosophy of design - or the shape, the weight and the cost ; A chapter of accidents - a study in sin, error and metal fatigue ; Efficiency and aesthetics - or the world we have to live in -- Appendix 1. Handbooks and formulae -- Appendix 2. Beam theory -- Appendix 3. Torsion -- Appendix 4. The efficiency of columns and panels under compression loads.