Donald E. Knuth, pub. Addison Wesley, ISBN: 0-201-13448-9
The book; the definitive guide to the use of TeX
, written by the
system's creator.
I quote: This manual is intended for people who have never used TeX
before, as well as experienced hackers. In other words, it's supposed
to be a panacea that satisfies everybody, at the risk of satisfying nobody.
Everything you need to know about TeX
is explained here somewhere, and
so are a lot of things that most users don't care about.
Hard work, but ultimately rewarding. Not for the faint hearted.
Raymond Seroul and Silvio Levy, pub. Springer-Verlag, ISBN: 0-387-97562-4
I quote: A friendly introduction to TeX
. It is addressed primarily to
beginners, but it contains much information that will be useful to
aspiring TeX
wizards.
Stephan von Bechtolsheim, pub. Springer-Verlag,
ISBN: 0-387-97595-0, 0-387-97596-0, 0-387-97597-0, 0-387-97598-0, or
0-387-97296-X,
for Volumes I, II, III and IV, respectively, or the set.
If you really want to learn TeX
thoroughly, this is the book for
you. Everything is covered, covered in detail, explained well, and
illustrated with examples. The draw back is that it comes in at 37.50
pounds Sterling per volume, though buying the complete set gets you a
discount.
First, there is of course Leslie Lamport's LaTeX : A Document Preparation System, User's Guide and Reference Manual, pub. Addison-Wesley, ISBN: 0-201-15790-X. I would be happy to receive recommendations for other books.