A former student writes:
I’m going to get a Tufte book. Do you recommend “The Visual Display of Quantitative Information” or “Envisioning Information?”
My reply: My favorite is his second book, Envisioning Information. His first book was his breakthrough but the second book is the one that I learned the most from, myself.
P.S. I don’t know if this counts as a 3-star thread.
Andrew's counting starts only with Edward Tufte's self-published graphics books. He wrote various others before "Visual Display". His 1974 text wears pretty well and is available in .pdf form.
In terms of the question, I'd nominate "Visual Display" as my favourite, and I've heard the same comment from many other statistically-minded people.
Nick, do you have a title for the 1974 text or a link to a PDF?
Chris: http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/dapp/index.html
"Envisioning" is more practical, IMO, but both excellent.
You asked about Tufte, but I have found the work of William Cleveland to be more practical.