"In a scene from Cloud Cuckoo Land, a couple of Renaissance scribes from the Italian city of Urbino have travelled to Constantinople hunting for ancient texts. The Ottoman army is advancing every day and such manuscripts may be lost or destroyed in the coming siege. Meeting an orphaned girl who volunteers to scavenge for them, they explain what they are searching for. What they desire most, one says, “is an account that contains the entire world”. “And the splendours beyond,” adds the other. “A book of all things.”

https://www.ft.com/content/c825ae77-cfc8-4d9d-9185-f352dafb9483