Jaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20

Jaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis.Jaargang 20

bronJaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20. Uitgeverij Vantilt, Nijmegen /

Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging, Leiden 2013

Zie voor verantwoording: https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_jaa008201301_01/colofon.php

Let op: boeken en tijdschriftjaargangen die korter dan 140 jaar geleden verschenen zijn, kunnenauteursrechtelijk beschermd zijn. Welke vormen van gebruik zijn toegestaan voor dit werk of delen

ervan, lees je in de gebruiksvoorwaarden.

i.s.m.

https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/_jaa008201301_01/colofon.php

https://dbnl.org/titels/gebruiksvoorwaarden.php?id=_jaa008201301

7

[Nummer 20]Voorwoord

Voor u ligt het jubileumnummer van het Jaarboek voor NederlandseBoekgeschiedenis, sinds 1993 de meest wezenlijke manifestatie van de NederlandseBoekhistorische Vereniging.Twintig jaar! In een feestelijk voorwoord horen vanzelfsprekend enkele

opmerkingen over heden, verleden en toekomst. Ik besef dat ik met die ‘enkeleopmerkingen’ veel boekhistorici die zich de afgelopen jaren met hart en ziel voor devereniging hebben ingespannen, tekort doe door ze niet te noemen. Ik hoop dat u mijdat vergeeft.

Ter zake.

Het Nederlandse boekhistorische landschap leek in het begin van de jaren 1990 aardigaangekleed; de Tiele-Stichting bevorderde ‘de wetenschap van het boek en dedrukkunst en de daarmede samenhangende technieken’, het genootschap PetrusScriverius behartigde de belangen van de wat traditioneler ingestelde liefhebbers vanboek en bibliotheek en het gezelschap Convoluut bood boekhistorici eenuitwisselingsplatform voor lopend onderzoek. Toch werden niet alle doelgroepenbereikt. In een ongepubliceerde tekst uit 1993 wenste Paul Hoftijzer een landelijkevereniging ‘die allen, die een actieve of passieve interesse voor de Nederlandseboekgeschiedenis hebben, kan samenbinden en die tevens de cultuurhistorischewaarde van het boek onder de aandacht van een breed publiek kan brengen endaarvoor, waar nodig, ook in de bres kan springen’. Niet veel later was Hoftijzer eenvan de oprichters van de Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging (NBV).Bij de oprichting van de NBV waren de volgende boekhistorici betrokken: Han

Brouwer, Berry Dongelmans, Paul Hoftijzer, Marika Keblusek, Lisa Kuitert, OttoLankhorst, Jeroen Salman en Garrelt Verhoeven. De vereniging bleek een schot inde roos. De leden kregen een Jaarboek en werden uitgenodigd voor excursies ensymposia. Al gauw groeide hun aantal tot 300. En de inspanningen van dedaaropvolgende besturen en redacties hebben ervoor gezorgd dat het ledental meerdan verdubbelde.De NBV heeft ook de afgelopen jaren niet stil gezeten. Op 6 april 2010 organiseerde

de NBV een congres in Utrecht, getiteld, ‘Aanstormend en gevestigd’, over de standvan de boekgeschiedenis in Nederland. De presentaties waren interessant en dediscussies

Jaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20

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levendig.Waren de deelnemers onverdeeld positief? Neen. In september van dat jaarpubliceerde De Boekenwereld (26, nr. 5) een kritische reactie op dat congres. Hetartikel was geschreven door Vlaamse boekhistorici en droeg de fraaie, naar Xenophonverwijzende titel ‘Thalassa! Thalassa? De laaglandse boekgeschiedenis en haar zeevanmogelijkheden’. De auteurs maakten bezwaar tegen de geest van zelfvoldaanheiddie het congres volgens hen had gedomineerd. Ze constateerden een gebrek aan visie,en een ‘gemis aan theoretische reflectie en methodologische transparantie’. Naar hunmening dreigde het draagvlak van onze wetenschap te worden verpulverd. Hoewelsommigen de kritiek eloquent pareerden, werd duidelijk dat de Vlamingen eengevoelige snaar hadden geraakt.De NBV pakte de handschoen op en organiseerde samen met de Tiele-Stichting op

10 februari 2012 een expert meeting onder de titel ‘Een toekomst voor deboekwetenschap’. De sprekers waren Kevin Absilis (Universiteit Antwerpen), JeroenSalman (Universiteit Utrecht), August den Hollander (Vrije Universiteit) en Boudiende Vries (Universiteit van Amsterdam). De dag werd geleid door Lisa Kuitert(Universiteit van Amsterdam). Er was veel ruimte voor discussie en de aanwezigeboekhistorici maakten daar goed gebruik van. Een verslag van de bijeenkomst werdgepubliceerd.Concluderend werd gesteld dat er een intensievere gedachtenwisseling op

vakinhoudelijk vlak noodzakelijk is en dat - om de organisatie van het vak teversterken - actieve samenwerking essentieel is: een platform voor de boekwetenschapkan helpen de Nederlandse én Vlaamse boekhistorische krachten te bundelen endaarmee de toenemende concurrentiestrijd op de subsidiemarkt versterkt aan te gaan.En nu moeten we concrete stappen zetten. De NBV en de Tiele-Stichting organiserenin samenwerking met de Vlaamse Werkgroep Boekgeschiedenis (VWB) dit jaar eenvervolg op de expert meeting, waarin de theorie in de praktijk wordt omgezet.Uit het bovenstaande zou kunnen blijken dat de aandacht van het zittende bestuur

van de NBV vooral uitgaat naar de wetenschap. Maar zo is het niet. Voor het begrijpenvan de geschiedenis van het boek is de wetenschap weliswaar essentieel, maar voorhet overbrengen van de daaruit voortvloeiende kennis kunnen naast doorwrochteartikelen ook andere activiteitenworden ingezet, zoals leerzame excursies, interessantejaarvergaderingen (deze keer in het eveneens jubilerendeVredespaleis) en prikkelendelezingen. En daar laat de NBV het dit jaar niet bij. In november wordt een congresgeorganiseerdwaarin acht deskundigen vanuit hun boekhistorische expertise uitleggenwat de geschiedenis van het boek ons kan vertellen over de mediarevolutie waar wijmiddenin zitten, in het bijzonder als het gaat om de receptie van teksten. Dedeelnemers aan het congres krijgen volop de ruimte om met de sprekers in debat tegaan.Tot slot wil ik u iets vertellen over ons Jaarboek. In een geanimeerde discussie

kwamen redactie en bestuur tot de conclusie dat het Jaarboek een nieuwe impulsnodig had. Deels werd de voorgestelde vernieuwing gedreven door wens om deaanlevering van hoogstaande artikelen te garanderen en een zo breedmogelijk publiekte bedienen, maar ook de veranderingen bij de andere Nederlandstaligeboekhistorische periodieken, Quaerendo, De Gulden Passer en De Boekenwereldnoopten tot een herijking van de koers van ons Jaarboek.We hebben ons voorgenomenom vanaf 2014 ook Engelstalige artikelen op


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te nemen met een uitvoerige Nederlandstalige samenvatting. De ruime meerderheidvan de artikelen blijft overigens Nederlandstalig. Het onderscheid tussenthemanummers en ‘gewone’ nummers wordt losgelaten: ieder Jaarboek zal eenthematisch gedeelte bevatten, aangevuld met ‘losse’ artikelen. Daarnaast krijgen deboekbesprekingen een prominentere plaats. De redactie zal er vanzelfsprekend scherpop letten dat de artikelen zo toegankelijk mogelijk blijven. Zo krijgt het Jaarboekeen heldere positie tussen het volledig Engelstalige tijdschrift Quaerendo en hetvernieuwde, laagdrempelige bladDe Boekenwereld. Deze nieuwe opzet lijkt veel ophet voorstel dat door Hoftijzer in de hierboven aangehaalde tekst uit 1993 werdgeformuleerd: ‘Het recent opgerichte Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte metzijn kortere en langere artikelen, Forschungsberichte, documentaire bijdragen,mededelingen en recensies is wat mij betreft een uitstekend model’.De NBV heeft in de twintig jaar van haar bestaan enorm veel ondernomen om in

het Nederlandse taalgebied iedereen te bereiken die geïnteresseerd is in degeschiedenis van het boek. Daar mogen wij trots op zijn. Het is duidelijk dat hetnooit was gelukt zonder al die boekliefhebbers die hun (vrije) tijd hebben opgeofferdom dit mogelijk te maken. Hoewel, ‘opoffering’... Ik weet zeker dat niemand dat zovoelde. Dit is leuk werk! Ik hoop, nee verwacht dat wij op de ingezette weg nog heelveel jaren zullen voortgaan en dat we de NBV vitaal, scherp, actueel en allemachtiginteressant houden.

Hans MulderVoorzitter van de Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging


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Preface

This is the jubilee issue of the Jaarboek voor Nederlandse Boekgeschiedenis, theYearbook for Dutch Book History, since 1993 the prime organ of the NederlandseBoekhistorische Vereniging, the Dutch Book Historical Society.A preface celebrating two decades of book-historical activities in the Netherlands

should of course include a few remarks about past, present, and future. I am awarethat by offering ‘a few remarks’ and not mentioning anyone by name, I seem to beforgetting all those many book historians who have been dedicating themselves withall their hearts to the society these past years. I hope you will forgive me on thisscore.

And now to the point.

In the early 1990s, the Dutch book historical landscape appeared to be neatly trimmed,with the Tiele Foundation promoting ‘the science of the book and the art of printingand related technologies’, the Petrus Scriverius society looking after the interests ofthe more traditionally inclined book and library lover, and Convoluut offering bookhistorians a forum for communicating the results of current research. All the same,it seemed not all if the target audience was covered, and in an unpublished paper of1993 Paul Hoftijzer accordingly hoped for a national society ‘capable of uniting allthose with an active or passive interest in Dutch book history, as well as of informingthe wider public about the cultural and historical importance of the book and ifnecessary championing its cause’. Not much later, Hoftijzer became one of thefounding members of the Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging (NBV), the DutchBook Historical Society.The following book historians were involved in founding the NBV: Han Brouwer,

Berry Dongelmans, Paul Hoftijzer, Marika Keblusek, Lisa Kuitert, Otto Lankhorst,Jeroen Salman and Garrelt Verhoeven. The society was an immediate hit, with morethan 300 members joining the society in a relatively short time. Membership morethan doubled in the following years thanks to the efforts of successive executivecommitees and editorial boards. All members of the NBV receive a free copy of theannual Jaarboek and are regularly invited to attend excursions and conferences.The NBV has not rested on its laurels these past few years. On 6 April 2010 the

socie-


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ty organised a conference in Utrecht, entitled ‘Aanstormend en gevestigd’ (Freshand established), on the current state of book history in the Netherlands. Thepresentations were interesting and the discussions were lively, which might suggestthat the conference was unanimously regarded as a success. This was not the case,however, as a critical review appeared in the September issue of De Boekenwereld(26, no. 5) that same year. The article was written by Flemish book historians underthe fetching title, reminiscent of Xenophon: ‘Thalassa! Thalassa? De laaglandseboekgeschiedenis en haar zee van mogelijkheden’ (Thalassa! Thalassa? Book historyin the LowCountries and its sea of opportunities). In their article, the authors objectedto a perceived air of self-satisfaction dominating the conference, which they also felthad suffered from shortage of vision and ‘a lack of theoretical reflection andmethodological transparency’. They believed the basis for the discipline of bookhistory was in danger of crumbling. Although there have been some eloquentresponses to foil that criticism, it was obvious that the Flemish colleagues had hit anerve.The NBV rose to the challenge by organising, together with the Tiele Foundation,

an expert meeting on 10 February 2012 called ‘Een toekomst voor de boekwetenschap’(A Future for Book Science). The speakers were Kevin Absilis (University ofAntwerp), Jeroen Salman (University of Utrecht), August den Hollander (VUUniversity) and Boudien de Vries (University of Amsterdam). The event was chairedby Lisa Kuitert (University of Amsterdam). The programme allowed plenty of roomfor discussion and the attending book historians eagerly availed themselves of thisopportunity. An account of the meeting was published later.The conclusion reached was that a more thorough professional exchange of views

was needed in the field of book history and that active cooperation was vital tostrengthen the structure of the discipline. A platform for book science may helpharness Dutch and Flemish book-historical forces so together they can face theincreasing competition in the world of funding. It is now time to take some concretesteps. In cooperation with the VlaamseWerkgroep Boekgeschiedenis (VWB, FlandersBook Historical Society), the NBV and the Tiele Foundation are therefore organisinga follow-up expert meeting, putting theory into practice.Although it might appear from the above that the executive committee of the NBV

is mainly focussed on scholarship, this is not the case. Although we need scholarlyresearch to fully understand all aspects of the history of the book, the accumulatedscholarly expertise can be communicated in other ways than through academicallysound articles only, for instance by offering instructive excursions, interesting annualmeetings (this year in the famous Peace Palace in The Hague, which happens to becelebrating its first centenary) and stimulating papers. This is not all the NBV will beoffering its members this year. At a conference scheduled for November, eight expertson book history will be sharing their views on what the history of the book can tellus about the media revolution we are now witnessing, especially with regard to thereception of texts. There will also be plenty of opportunity for attendees to interactwith the speakers.Finally, I would like to turn to the Jaarboek itself. Following an animated meeting,

the executive committee and the editorial board came to the conclusion that the Jaar-


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boek needed a new impulse. The proposed innovations were partly driven by a desireto secure a steady flow of high-quality articles and reach as wide an audience aspossible. However, a number of changes introduced in the other Dutch-languagebook-historical periodicals, Quaerendo, De Gulden Passer and De Boekenwereld,have also challenged us to review our existing policy with regard to the Jaarboek.We have therefore decided to welcome English-language contributions (accompaniedby an extensive Dutch summary) as of 2014, although the majority of the articleswill continue to be published in Dutch. The distinction between special issues and‘ordinary’ issues will be abolished: from now on, every Jaarboek will contain athematic section in addition to separate articles. The book review section will alsoreceive greater prominence. The editorial board will naturally see to it that the articlescontinue to be readable and accessible. These changes will ensure that the Jaarboekoccupies a clear niche in between the completely English-language periodicalQuaerendo and the renewed and easily accessible Dutch-language magazine DeBoekenwereld. This new approach would appear to be very similar to what Hoftijzeralready proposed in the 1993 paper referred to above: ‘In my opinion, the recentlyestablished Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte, with its shorter and longerarticles, Forschungsberichte, documentary contributions, notes and reviews, is amodel worth emulating.’In the twenty years of its existence, the NBV has undertaken a great deal to reach

all those interested in the history of the book in the Dutch-language areas, a feat thatfills us with pride. It is at the same time very clear that we would never have beenable to achieve any of this without all those bibliophiles out there who have sacrificedmuch of their time to make it all work. ‘Sacrifice’ is perhaps not a good word to usein this context, as I am sure nobody has ever experienced it as such. It's simplywonderful work to do! I hope and indeed expect that we will be able to continuealong this new road for many more years and will succeed in keeping the NBV alively, to-the-point, up-to-date and absolutely riveting place to be.

Hans MulderChairman, Dutch Book Historical Society


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Introduction

Founded in 1993, the Dutch Book Historical Society (Nederlandse BoekhistorischeVereniging, NBV) is a society for those who enjoy books both old and new, and inevery shape and form. The NBV is a society with about 650 members, ranging fromprominent academics to amateur researchers and from journalists to antiquarians. Itpublishes the Jaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis (Dutch book historyyearbook), providing an overview of new research in the field of Dutch and Flemishbook history.At the tenth anniversary of the NBV the yearbook was dedicated to developments

in the publishing business, especially the book trade and publishing houses in theNetherlands in the second half of the twentieth century. In 2010 the yearbook wasdevoted to the state of book historical research in the Netherlands. On the occasionof the twentieth anniversary of the NBV in 2013 the editors wanted to look beyondthe LowCountries, to see what happens in the field of book research and book historyin the rest of the world. What are the international developments and evolutions inthe field and what are the challenges for the future?We imagined an attractive yearbook that expresses an internationally shared

(academic) passion for books and puts the various national book historical societieson the world map. In an invitation letter we wrote that we were looking for‘high-quality authors, local and renowned specialists, who would be able and willingto write a historiographical overview of book-historical activities’ in their countries.We asked explicitly for a state of affairs in the field of book science, current insightsand results in the field of book science and the future vision of the book-historicalsociety.We received as many as thirteen enthusiastic contributions from around the world.

In random order: China (Frederik Nesta); Japan (Peter Kornicki); Spain (Benito RialCostas); South America (Cesar Manrique); Great Britain (David McKitterick);Belgium (Stijn van Rossem); Germany (Christine Haug, Slávka Rude-Porubská andWolfgang Schmitz); Austria (Peter Frank, Johannes Frimmel and Murray Hall);South Africa (Archie Dick); Australia (Roger Osborne), Norway (Aina Nøding),Sweden (Rikard Wingård) and Denmark (Anders Toftgaard).


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The articles appeared to be quite different, both in content and form. All authors havetaken the request very seriously, but they have also answered it in their very ownway. Browsing this yearbook, the reader will encounter no uniformity in the structureof the articles. The articles can of course be read independently from each other, butwe also hope that comparing the approaches and views expressed in them will yieldnew insights.A few things can be said about the content of the articles. In some contributions,

the current state of affairs is explained from the general history of the book in aparticular country. The study of the Chinese book, for example, has a long history,dating back to the ninth century when woodblock printing first appeared. Until fairlyrecently, Chinese book history was primarily the domain of scholars in China andthe adjacent regions that used Chinese characters for their own literature. In Japan,studies of the history of the book concentrate on the Edo period (1603-1868), whencommercial publishing came of age andwhen in a short period books became commongoods to be bought or borrowed by almost everyone. In South America in thenineteenth century, the study of the book was all about the process of consolidationof national identities and therefore in the creation of national bibliographicalrepositories and national libraries.The biggest surprise was that ‘book science’ and ‘book history’ have a different

meaning in almost every country. In the Netherlands book science includes allcultural-historical, economic, social-cultural, sociological and professional researchin the book, and archiving, preservation and distribution of relevant documents anddata. Swedish book research spans evenmore areas connected to book history: authorstudies, history of graphic design, textual criticism etcetera. In Norway receptionstudies are also considered to be part of book science. Research areas range fromcore topics such as the history of reading, the book market and libraries, to areassuch as censorship, editing or media history, where book history provides one ofseveral perspectives. In Spain, on the other hand, book science is almost exclusivelythe domain of analytical bibliographers. The different views of what does and doesnot belong to ‘book science’ are related to research traditions in the different countries,the status of the discipline and its institutional infrastructure.In the Netherlands, the study of the book has a long tradition and in the twentieth

century the history of the book became an academic discipline. In a survey of thehistory of the book in the Low Countries,1 Marieke van Delft described thedevelopment of book science from the appointment of the first extraordinary professorof Book History and Bibliography at the University of Amsterdam in 1954 up to thestate of affairs in the twenty-first century. This first chair was founded by the Dr.P.A. Tielestichting, a key organisation promoting the study of the book. Since 2003,the Tielestichting has taken the form of a joint venture for book science in whichalmost all scientific and other organisations and institutions in this field arerepresented. Currently there are three Tiele-chairs in Dutch universities: one at theUniversity of Amsterdam (paleography and codicology), and two at the Universityof Leiden (Dutch history of the book in the early modern peri-

1 M. van Delft [et al.] (eds.), New perspectives in book history. Contributions from the LowCountries. Leiden 2006, 7-15.


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od and Dutch history of the book in the modern period). The Universities ofAmsterdam and Leiden have MA courses in book science and codicology. And thenthere is of course the Dutch Book Historical Society (NBV), specific to the field ofthe book.Although Belgian book historians have broadened their horizon internationally in

terms of methodology, topic and the dissemination of their research, book sciencein Flanders has still not found an institutional port. There is only the Flemish BookHistorical Society (VWB), founded in 1996. This society has increased its activitiesand membership over the years but according to Stijn Van Rossem, there is less andless place for research within the academic libraries. Also, there are no book historycourses in the Flemish universities, and certainly no research group or book scienceprogramme.Archie Dick writes that by comparison with many countries, book history in South

Africa represents a growing but modest body of work and there is still no institutionalhome for research and tuition programmes of book and print culture. Plans for aresearch-driven Centre for the Book at the National Library of South Africa evenevaporated when it became presentist and development-oriented in the 1990s.In Germany, on the other hand, book science has become a significant academic

discipline with various institutions and facilities both inside and outside universities,special and research libraries, scholarly societies and associations. In contrast to thesituation in Germany, book science in Austria has not yet established itself as a fieldof study at universities, although, in order to create a common forum for bookhistorians in Austria, the Gesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich was foundedin 1998. The main goal of the association is to initiate and promote book historicalresearch projects and to encourage links with international research.

Although the existence of the leading international scholary association for historiansof print culture, SHARP (The Society for the History of Authorship, Reading andPublishing), suggests otherwise, the developments in several countries in bookresearch turn out to be especially nationally oriented. However, there are varioussigns of a growing awareness of the need to seek international connections ratherthan to construct national histories. Between the Scandinavian countries, there arelong-standing traditions of cooperation in the field of book history. An example ofan interscandinavian network is The Nordic forum for book history. On aninfrastructural level digitisation and database projects are flourishing. The SwedishProBok, a database for information on bookbindings and provenance from the handpress period, is a case in point.For the United Kingdom, David McKitterick signals a growing interest in the

history of information that suggests a new stress on the relationship between printand other forms of communication. He believes that such research requiresinternational outlooks. Also in Australia en New-Zealand the first wave of nationalfoundational studies laid the groundwork for a reassessment of the national in thecontext of international or transnational studies. In his contribution, Roger Osbornedescribes two case studies, which combined suggest future directions and possibilitiesfor book history that examine much broader inter-cultural relations, transfers andexchanges in projects that will need to embrace collaboration and group authorship.The answer to the question ‘what


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are the challenges in the future?’ that emerges in most of the contributions, therefore,is that book research must get a trans- and international dimension.This yearbook contributes to this by offering an initial overview of the state of

affairs in the field of book research and book history worldwide and the internationaldevelopments and evolutions in the field. We hope that it will be an incentive for amore global perspective on book science and that it will lead to new discussions,insights and results and, above all, more international cooperation. The authors ofthe various contributions have made a start. We are very grateful to them.

Sandra van VoorstEditor-in-chief of the Dutch book history yearbook - Jaarboek voor Nederlandse

boekgeschiedenis


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David McKitterickThe United Kingdom: a national history of the book

National histories

To dare to embark on a national history of the book demands a certain boldness.Overall concepts may be clear, but the details of how topics will relate to each othercan emerge only by experience. Some contributors will prove more willing thanothers to work in a team. Editors must try to ensure that there is some continuity.More controversially, there is always the question of what exactly is the nation withwhich the project is concerned. Where are its linguistic, geographical or politicalboundaries?What has been the relationship between national ambitions and nationalimperialism?How have they affected, and how have they been affected by, the historyof books in the broadest sense? How have all these questions changed over thecenturies, and to what extent can they be accommodated? At a practical level, whatbibliographical sources are available? Most of all, every national history of the bookcarries with it a question. How does it fit into the international world? So far, andperhaps understandably given the resources available, no history, in any country, hasattempted an adequate answer to this question. Opinions differ even as to what wemean by the subject, the history of the book.It is therefore not surprising that in recent years Britain has produced not only a

national history of the book, but also two multi-authored general compilations bothof which have sought to take a world view: one published by Blackwell and consistingof a series of short essays, and the other, with many more dictionary-like entries, byOxford University Press.1 In the world-wide application of book history, so muchremains only partially explored, and so many connections have still to be made.Over the last few years, secondary literature on domestic topics has been dominated

in Britain by two projects published by CambridgeUniversity Press: the seven-volumeHistory of the book in Britain (1999-, six volumes published so far), and theaccompanying three-volume History of libraries in Britain and Ireland (2006).

1 S. Eliot, J. Rose (eds.), A companion to the history of the book. Oxford 2007; M.F. Suarez,H.R. Woudhuysen (eds.), The Oxford companion to the book. Oxford 2010.


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Figure 1. The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain. Volume 6. Cambridge 2009

Both acknowledge their considerable debt to the inspiration of L'histoire de l'éditionfrançaise (1982-1986), and L'histoire des bibliothèques françaises (1988-1992),works whose own boundaries - thematic, political and geographical - themselvesoffered a challenge to anyone following in their footsteps. But these date from someyears ago, and the intervening time has brought new perspectives. Other countriesincluding the United States, Canada, and Australia have worked on their own nationalhistories, while nearer home there have developed projects concerningWales, Scotlandand Ireland.2 The existence of these other projects are reminders of how the Britishbook trade has been international ever since early times. The further and relatedseries for Ireland, Scotland and Wales provide not only for different perspectives,but also for fuller accounts of topics that had either to be set aside in the larger plan,or for which there was too little space.From the beginning, the project was conceived as a history of the book in Britain.

In other words, the indefinite article was a reminder that such a history could neverbe conclusive; and secondly, that this was not a history of the British book, but ofbooks as they were traded and used in Britain, the extent to which British printing,publishing and reading have always depended on imports and exports. Each volumecontains sev-

2 P.H. Jones, E. Rees (eds.), A nation and its books. Aberystwyth 1998; B. Bell (ed.), TheEdinburgh history of the book in Scotland. Edinburgh 2007- (three volumes of a plannedfour published so far); R. Welch, B. Walker (eds.), The Oxford history of the Irish book.Oxford 2006 - (three volumes of a planned five published so far).


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eral studies in more detail (not singled out in the present survey) beside chapters ofmore general application. This apart, the long time-span for the History of the bookin Britain, from Roman times to the present, inevitably meant a considerabledivergence of approach. Not only did most contributors prefer not to be led by theory.More importantly, evidence for each period exists on very different scales. It wasthis, for example, that led to the decision to include a full account of the processesof printing and type-founding not in the volume that included Caxton, England's firstprinter, but that for the eighteenth century, where the evidence of printers' manuals,archives such as those of the Bowyers3 or Cambridge University Press, and survivingequipment such as that at Oxford University Press, could bemarshalled into a coherentand authoritative survey. The volume covering 1400 to 1557 was largely concernedwith readership, that for 1557 to 1695 with the book trade, and that for 1830 to 1914with the increasing ubiquity of print as well as with the manymechanical innovations.The concluding volume for the period since 1914 is expected in the next two or threeyears.In general, the History of the book in Britain has not been concerned with the

world of print as a whole. The appearance in 2011 of the first volume, entitledCheapprint in Britain and Ireland to 1660, edited by Joad Raymond, of a plannednine-volumeOxford history of popular print culture, was a timely reminder of someof the wider issues concerning what it meant to live in a world that was increasinglymanaged by, and dependent on, print. This examined not only popular literature ofthe cheapest kind, but also newspapers and the world of ephemera.If the last few years have been dominated in Britain by the Cambridge project, it

has also aired a host of further questions. In the following, I offer an account of someof the work that has been done in Britain concerning the history of the book.Occasionally I have alluded to work by scholars based in other countries, where thisseemed to be particularly helpful in setting a context. All of it, without exception,airs needs for further investigations and sometimes new kinds of questions, whetherabout different approaches, different kinds of evidence, different groups of people,or different genres of publication. Sometimes the questions are explicit. More oftenthey are implied challenges. In general, the twentieth century has so far attracted lessin-depth consideration than earlier ones.

Infrastructures: people

If we search for a date to which we may attach the beginning of institutional interestin the history of the book, then we can do no better than look to the foundation ofthe Bibliographical Society in 1892. This has been followed since by otherbibliographical societies, including those at Edinburgh, Oxford and Cambridge.Withan eye to slightly different emphases, the Printing Historical Society was foundedin 1964. The still predominantly Anglo-American Society for the History ofAuthorship, Reading and

3 K. Maslen, J. Lancaster (eds.), The Bowyer ledgers. London/New York 1991.


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Publishing (SHARP) is a more recent arrival, founded in 1991. The principal annualspecialist lecture series are the Sandars lectures, founded at Cambridge in 1895, theLyell lectures (Oxford, founded 1952) and the Panizzi lectures (British Library,founded 1985). In university teaching, where the vagaries and changing demands ofacademic programmes and funding mean that there is no guarantee of longevity, theSchool of Advanced Study at the University of London offers an MA in the historyof the book, as well as annual summer schools. At Oxford, the Bodleian Library hasrecently established a Centre for the Study of the Book, and at Oxford BrookesUniversity there is an International Centre for Publishing Studies. The University ofEdinburgh established a Centre for the History of the Book in 1995. At Cambridge,graduate seminars on the history of material texts draw their membership fromdepartments including English, history, modern languages, the history of art andarchitecture, music and the history of science. At Reading, the Department ofTypography has a strong historical element, reflected in its periodic series ofTypography papers. The Open University offers a Book History Research Group.This list is far from exhaustive, but it indicates the range of approaches taken inteaching, managing and encouraging the subject.

Infrastructures: bibliographical resources

For the two Cambridge histories, it was possible to tackle a subject stretching overso long a period thanks not only to sufficient contributors, but also to a bibliographicalinfrastructure. For the period from the mid-fifteenth century to the nineteenth century,there are reliable, if varyingly complete, retrospective bibliographies. The EnglishShort-Title Catalogue, based partly on older works including STC and Wing andcovering 1475 to 1800, is not quite comprehensive, but it provides a sufficientlydetailed account of what has survived.4TheNineteenth-Century STC is less advanced,5

but again it offers a broader conspectus than is available in what is otherwise themost comprehensive record, in the British Library's catalogue. Neither of these, ofcourse, is entirely complete; and neither lists what has not survived, not only of booksbut also of newspapers, pamphlets and all kinds of miscellaneous ephemeral material.To that extent, it remains difficult to judge with complete accuracy what is meantby a society dependent on print.As in some other countries, much effort has been given over the last few years to

compiling essential retrospective databases. Apart from the now well-establishedCERL,6 efforts are being made in St Andrews and in Dublin to compile a Universalshort-title catalogue, initially to 1600 but now to be extended into the seventeenthcentury.7 Allied to them is the manuscript archival record. A sustained campaign toidentify and preserve the archives of printers, publishers and other parts of the booktrade has enabled new and fresh work. The archives of the eighteenth-century Londonprinters

4 See estc.bl.uk.5 See nstc.chadwyck.com.6 See www.cerl.org/web.7 See www.ustc.ac.uk.


23

William Bowyer father and son have been published in facsimile, with anaccompanying catalogue of the work recorded in the ledgers. Those of CambridgeUniversity Press, published in part some years ago and now readily available in theUniversity Library, have made possible a comprehensive re-evaluation of the historyof the oldest press in the world (founded 1583).8 The Longman archives, housed inReading University Library with those of several other publishers, were the basis ofa substantial history of the firm, with a history dating from 1724.9 The papers of thefirm of the publishers John Murray (founded at Edinburgh in the late eighteenthcentury) were bought by the National Library of Scotland, and are being steadilyexploited.10 Many of the Macmillan papers are now in the British Library, and havebeen used for work on authors including ‘Lewis Carroll’, Tennyson, and Yeats.11 Amajor history of Oxford University Press, again based largely on archives that wereonly partly accessible until recently, will be published in the next few years. InLondon, the Faber archives are gradually becoming available online, and will cast agreat deal of light on the publishing of twentieth-century poets including T.S. Eliot,W.H. Auden, Ted Hughes and others.12 So far, most of these publishers' and printers'papers have been little analysed by economic historians.The third crucial part is access. The existence of EEBO (Early English Books online)

and Ecco (Eighteenth-Century Collections Online), with their full-length images ofthousands of books published between 1475 and 1800 has in the last few yearstransformed the study of British history generally, not only the history of the book.But they are only one aspect. Projects such as the digitisation of the Burney collectionof seventeenth- and eighteenth-century newspapers in the British Library, of the statepapers held at the National Archives and in some private collections, and of numerousnineteenth-century periodicals and newspapers, have made progress in researchpossible with a speed and on a scale never before imaginable. Other extensiveresources that have become available online, including the Old Bailey records(criminal trials), 1674-1913,13 and various Parliamentary and other state papers,14

have so far been explored only a little.Meanwhile there have been major on-line projects to record members of the book

trade. The British Book Trade Index, based at Birmingham, takes matters to c.1850,15

and there is a separate one for Scotland.16 The London Book Trades Database dealswith the trade in printed books to c.1830.17 Two recent local directories of the Suffolktrade, pub-

8 D. McKitterick, A history of Cambridge University Press. 3 vols., Cambridge 1992-2004.9 A. Briggs, A history of Longmans and their books, 1724-1990. Longevity in publishing.

London 2008.10 See digital.nls.uk/jma. For an example of work on the firm, see W. Zachs, The first John

Murray and the late eighteenth-century London book trade. Oxford 1998.11 E. James (ed.),Macmillan. A publishing tradition. Basingstoke 2002. For Yeats and others,

see the contributions by Warwick Gould concerning the Macmillan archives in C. Hutton,P. Walsh (eds.), The Irish book in English, 1891-2000. Oxford 2011, 481-510, 650-56.

12 See www.faber.co.uk/archive.13 See www.oldbaileyonline.org.14 For example the state papers online, 1509-1714: gale.cengage.co.uk/state-papers-online.15 See www.bbti.bham.ac.uk.16 See www.nls.uk/catalogues/scottish-book-trade-index.17 See www.oxbibsoc.org.uk/resources/london-book-trades-database.


24

lished in conventional format, may serve as examples of their kind.18 So far, thetwentieth century has been little explored, perhaps because so much appears to bereadily available in contemporary directories.Like their equivalents for books from continental Europe, projects such as EEBO

and ECCO bring immense benefits. They also all come at a price. As is beingincreasingly recognised, they focus attention on some survivals - which have beendigitised and made easily available - at the expense of others which have not; andthey distract from the further question that attends all kinds of evidence: what hasnot survived. The existence of a single digitised copy of a book is made to serve formany. I return to the importance of multiple pieces of evidence, and questions ofprovenance and copy-specific evidence, later on.Secondly, digital copies are surrogates. Reproductions, and especially reproductions

on film or digitised for screen presentation, cannot provide the physical immediacyof originals. Three dimensions are reduced to two, often distorted by the screen.Colour is unreliable. Paper quality and weight cannot be judged. Even the size oforiginals cannot be adequately represented. Variety is reduced to uniformity. Theseare not new issues.When in 1985 D.F.McKenzie reminded his audience at the BritishLibrary that ‘forms effect meaning’,19 he could not have predicted how rapidlyelectronic access to texts would develop in the coming years: in all manner of devicesboth small and large, and by all manner of software programmes.McKenzie's words,which have since been widely quoted, drew on long-standing bibliographical andcritical observation. Forms of presentation not only affect meaning; they also helpto create it, effect it. The maxim embodies a point that is central to the history of thebook: the importance of artefactual evidence. Notwithstanding the lip service widelypaid to McKenzie, one feature of recent work is an increasing divergence betweenhistorians who write about the history of the book from the evidence of primarymaterials - physical books whose format, weight, colour and materials are visibleand tangible in all their glory, expense, cheapness, beauty or ugliness, pristine andbarely touched or grubby from use - and those for whom secondary records oraccounts are sufficient.

Varieties of book history

We may now turn to more particular aspects of book history. The fifteenth centuryhas been exceptionally well served, with two major catalogues and one on-goingproject that has produced a number of unexpected results. The long-awaitedpublication of BMC XI, the catalogue of fifteenth-century English printed books inthe British Library, was based on work dating from the first years of the twentiethcentury and continued by successive members of the staff of the British Museum(from 1973 the British

18 T. Copsey, Ipswich book trades. A biographical dictionary of persons connected with thebook & periodical trades in Ipswich. Ipswich 2011; T. Copsey, Suffolk book trades. Abiographical dictionary. Ipswich 2012.

19 D.F. McKenzie, Bibliography and the sociology of texts. London 1986, 4.


25

Library).20 But it was brought to completion by Lotte Hellinga, with crucial help(especially concerning paper evidence as a means of dating books) from PaulNeedham.Muchmore than a catalogue, this volume also offered an introduction caston a far greater scale than its predecessors, work that in itself provided an accountof English fifteenth-century printing fuller than anything published, anywhere. Itaddressed not just issues of canon, dating, manufacture, authorship, the careers ofprinters and other topics that were to be expected, but also of survival and of thehistory of taste. It was pioneering not only in the detail of the contents of volumes,and the copy-specific information about provenance, type-setting, binding etc., butalso in the substantial introduction including such matters as details of productionand of survival, besides the traditional attention to type-faces. Dr Hellinga followedthis with two further projects; an updated edition of Duff's standard bibliography ofall English fifteenth-century printing,21 and a study of William Caxton and earlyprinting in England (2010). In the latter, and in an article in the Bulletin dubibliophile,22 she put forward a powerful argument that Caxton's press in the LowCountries was not at Bruges, but at Ghent.

Figure 2. Lotte Hellinga,William Caxton and Early Printing in England. London 2010

20 Catalogue of books printed in the XVth century now in the British Library. BMC Part XI.England. 't Goy-Houten 2007.

21 Printing in England in the fifteenth century. E. GordonDuff's bibliography with supplementarydescriptions, chronologies and a census of copies by Lotte Hellinga. London 2009.

22 L. Hellinga, ‘William Caxton, Colard Mansion and the printer in Type 1’, in: Bulletin dubibliophile (2011), 86-114.


26

Two other catalogues of incunables set new standards. The six-volume catalogue ofthose in the Bodleian Library at Oxford paid especial attention to themultiple authorialresponsibilities for books that have, traditionally, generally been credited to singleindividuals.23 In doing so, the catalogue made plain some of the ways in which ideasof authorship and attribution were to change quite dramatically during the followingcentury as medieval traditions were gradually displaced. At Cambridge, where aprinted catalogue of the incunabula in the University Library was published in 1954and was then thought to be a model of its kind, a new computer-based catalogue wasbegun. Instead of simply transferring existing data, each book has been examinedanew, resulting not only in the recording of more data, but also in the discovery ofnew features such as forgotten provenance details or evidence of use in annotationsby (occasionally) well-known individuals. The project has been accompanied by aninformative blog.24

With the Incunabula Short-Title Catalogue (ISTC), hosted in the British Library,25the existence of this new generation of catalogues (supplemented by others abroad,especially in Germany) lends a fresh impetus to incunable studies. Meanwhile,subsequent periods have been approached from various viewpoints. My own Print,manuscript and the search for order (Cambridge, 2003) examined aspects of whatwas meant by a printing revolution, showing that this was much more protractedthan is sometimes assumed: the period spanned 1450 to the 1830s, from thecomplicated transition from manuscript to print to the work of Charles Babbage.While work such as Harold Love's Scribal publication in seventeenth-century England(Oxford, 1993)26 had demonstrated the continuing importance of the written wordnot just for letters but also for publication, the interplay of print and manuscript isbecoming ever clearer with respect to its complexity.In the seventeenth century, the royal printers have attracted particular attention,

notably in the work of GrahamRees andMariaWakely on the century's early years.27

The anniversaries of the publication of the King James Bible in 1611, and of the1662 Book of Common Prayer, produced disappointingly little serious bibliographicalanalysis.Muchmore attention has been paid to questions of censorship in the sixteenthand seventeenth centuries, for example in a trio of works by Cyndia Susan Clegg.28

The business of bookselling and publishing was the subject of James Raven's Thebusiness of books, a study that, by taking a long period, showed how these changednot only in themselves but also in their relationship to each other.29 As internationalactivities, they were also reflected in the national histories of the book in Australia,

23 A. Coates [et al.], A catalogue of books printed in the XVth century and now in the BodleianLibrary, Oxford. 6 vols., Oxford 2005.

24 See www.lib.cam.ac.uk/deptserv/rarebooks/incblog.25 See www.bl.uk/catalogues/istc.26 Republished as The culture and commerce of texts. Amherst, MA, 1998. See also the work

of Brian Richardson on Italy (note 37 below).27 G. Rees, M. Wakely, Publishing, politics and culture. The King's printers in the reign of

James I and James VI. Oxford 2009.28 C.S. Clegg, Press censorship in Elizabethan England. Cambridge 1997; Press censorship

in Jacobean England. Cambridge 2001; Press censorship in Caroline England. Cambridge2008.

29 J. Raven, The business of books. Booksellers and the English book trade, 1450-1850. NewHaven 2007.


America and Canada, all chiefly (but by no means exclusively) anglophone markets.More detail of the eighteenth-century North Americanmarkets was offered in Raven'saccount of


27

the Charleston Literary Society,30 and in my own study of a Barbados bookseller,importing from London for re-export to the eastern seaboard.31 Such studies,complementing work done in the United States, serve as reminders of internationaltrade, readership and personal and financial dependence, and of how much moreneeds to be done in exploring the mechanics and effects of the trade bothinternationally and nationally. Some of this emerged in a collection of essays on thetwentieth-century antiquarian trade, edited byGilesMandelbrote.32This book reflecteda gradual - and long overdue - growth in interest in the ordinary second-hand tradeas well. For the seventeenth century, Matthew Yeo explored the use made ofsecond-hand booksellers by the infant Chetham's library in Manchester.33 For thenew books trade, Sue Bradley edited a collection of interviews by mostly Britishbooksellers and publishers.34 Two series of annual conferences, one on the provincialtrade and one designedmore generally, have producedmany useful and well-focussedstudies of both individuals and themes.35

There is a pressing need for the international nature of the whole subject ofproduction and trade to be more fully understood. It was explored in AndrewPettegree's The book in the renaissance (Yale UP, 2010), and in several more particularstudies. IanMaclean's work is also notable for assuming an international viewpoint.36

More locally, Brian Richardson's several books on Italian renaissance books havefrequently been concerned with the relationship between manuscript and print.37

Conor Fahy (d. 2009) left a body of work that helped to transform sixteenth-centurybibliographical study both in Italy and concerning Italian books.38 Taking a differentpalette, the publication of T.F. Earle's account of early modern Portuguese writersin some British libraries offered a welcome perspective on the ways in which interestsdeveloped, albeit within a strictly defined community.39 For older books, KristianJensen's Revolution and the antiquarian book employed catalogues, surviving copies

30 J. Raven, London booksellers and American customers. Transatlantic literary communityand the Charleston Library Society, 1748-1811. Columbia, SC, 2002.

31 D.McKitterick, ‘Books for Barbados and the British Atlantic colonies in the early eighteenthcentury’, Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society 118 (2009), 407-65.

32 G. Mandelbrote (ed.),Out of print and into profit. A history of the rare and secondhand booktrade in Britain in the twentieth century. London 2006.

33 M. Yeo, The acquisition of books by Chetham's Library, 1655-1700. Leiden 2011.34 S. Bradley (ed.), The British book trade. An oral history. London 2008.35 Papers from the series of Print Networks conferences have been edited by John Hinks and

others. Those of the Publishing Pathways series have been edited by RobinMyers and others:the volume Owners, annotators and the signs of reading (London 2005) includes a list ofthe contents of previous volumes.

36 I. Maclean, Learning and the market place. Essays in the history of the early modern book.Leiden 2009; Scholarship, commerce, religion. The learned book in the age of confessions,1560-1630. Cambridge, MA, 2012.

37 B. Richardson, Print culture in renaissance Italy. The editor and the vernacular text,1470-1600. Cambridge 1994; Printing, writers and readers in renaissance Italy. Cambridge1999;Manuscript culture in renaissance Italy. Cambridge 2009.

38 N. Harris, ‘Bibliografia delle publicazioni di Conor Fahy, 1999-2008’ (with references alsoto earlier work), in: La bibliofilia 111 (2009), 75-89.

39 T.F. Earle, Portuguese writers and English readers. Books by Portuguese writers printedbefore 1640 in the libraries of Oxford and Cambridge. Oxford 2009.


and both home and overseas (chiefly French) archives to explore some of the largestof all changes in international emphases: a lega-


28

cy that is still very much alive in the ways in which older western European booksare viewed in Britain.40

Ownership and reading

Interest in mentalités, expounded years ago by Robert Mandrou and others,41 has ledto a burgeoning industry concerning copy-specific information about books of allkinds. This has taken various forms. Two detailed surveys of surviving copies of theFirst Folio of Shakespeare considerably expanded as well as updated the work ofSidney Lee at the beginning of the twentieth century,42 and in their methods bearcomparison with the work of Owen Gingerich on the earliest editions of Copernicus'sDe revolutionibus.43 A similar approach was taken with surviving copies of SamuelPurchas's accounts of English voyages.44 While these have focussed on particularbooks, questions of provenance have beenmuchmore widely pursued for individuals.Accounts of National Trust libraries have brought much to light from shelves noteasily available to ordinary country-house visitors.45 Contents of other individualcollections have been summarised in the two series Libri Pertinentes and PrivateLibraries in Renaissance England (PLRE). David Pearson's Provenance research inbook history. A handbook (1994, revised reprint 1998) has proved to be especiallyinfluential in an area of study that has attracted considerable interest internationally.His account of a group of copies of a work by Francis Bacon, in his more generalstudy Books as history,46 offered a further example of the ranges of readership andtaste, readily apparent in the kinds of bookbindings distributed amongst early owners.Besides this, he has also made available an on-line index to English book owners inthe seventeenth century.47 For bookbinding studies, the completion of Mirjam Foot'smagisterial three-volume catalogue of the Henry Davis gift in the British Libraryoffers an exceptional, and international, range of examples, not just in the history ofdecoration but also frequently suggestive for the history of taste - and use.48 Thecontinuing work of Anthony Hobson, especially on bookbinding in the renaissance,has further demonstrated the extent to which the study of bindings can enable a better

40 K. Jensen, Revolution and the antiquarian book. Reshaping the past, 1780-1815. Cambridge2011.

41 R.Mandrou, Introduction à la France moderne. Essai de psychologie historique, 1500-1640.Paris 1961.

42 The more recent of these is E. Rasmussen, A.J. West (eds.), The Shakespeare first folio. Adescriptive catalogue. Basingstoke 2012.

43 O. Gingerich, An annotated census of Copernicus' De revolutionibus (Nuremberg 1543 andBasel 1566). Leiden 2002.

44 P. Neville-Sington, ‘The primary Purchas bibliography’, in: L.E. Pennington (ed.), ThePurchas handbook. Studies of the life, times and writings of Samuel Purchas, 1577-1626. 2vols., London 1997.

45 For example M. Purcell, The big house library in Ireland. Books in Ulster country houses.London 2011.

46 D. Pearson, Books as history. The importance of books beyond their texts. London 2008.47 See www.bibsoc.org.uk/electronic-publications.htm.48 M.M. Foot, The Henry Davis gift. A collection of bookbindings [now in the British Library].

London 1978-2007.


understanding of circles of scholarship and friendship.49As for ownership in Britain,in his Inventory of sale catalogues the late Robin Alston was concerned more withowners than with the book trade, and turned to newspaper advertisements to recordsales of

49 See for example A.R.A. Hobson, Renaissance book collecting. Jean Grolier and DiegoHurtado de Mendoza, their books and bindings. Cambridge 1999.


29

which no catalogue survives.50Unfortunately, his focusmeant that he omitted hundredsof catalogues recording anonymous sales. While the nineteenth century remainsunder-explored, the bicentennial history of the Roxburghe Club by Nicolas Barker(2012) was as much a reminder of major collectors as a challenge to further workamong those not at the centre of bibliographical fashion.

Figure 3. William St Clair, The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period. Cambridge 2004

The history of reading, drawing on bibliographical and archival evidence, hasattracted especial attention, exemplified in work on the early modern period, fromdifferent viewpoints, by Eamon Duffy, Kevin Sharpe and William Sherman.51 Thestudy of provenance can often be closely related to the study of reading as it ismanifest in personal annotation. So far, this kind of evidence has been less discussedfor later periods,

50 R. Alston, Inventory of sale catalogues of named and attributed owners of books sold byretail or auction, 1676-1800. An inventory of sales in the British Isles, America, the UnitedStates, Canada, India. 2 vols., Yeadon 2011.

51 E. Duffy, Marking the hours. English people and their prayers, 1240-1570. New Haven2006; K. Sharpe, Reading revolution. The politics of reading in early modern England. NewHaven 2000; W. Sherman, John Dee. The politics of reading and writing in the Englishrenaissance. Amherst 1997; W. Sherman, Used books. Marking readers in renaissanceEngland. Philadelphia 2007.


30

but meanwhile the history of reading is attracting very considerable interest amongliterary historians as well.William St Clair's The reading nation in the romantic period (2004) was based

on an examination of production statistics for different formats of books. It showedhow the ending of perpetual copyright in the 1770s affected publication in sometimesunexpected ways, and it demonstrated amongst much else the practice followed bypublishers of new titles exploiting each part of the market in turn, offering moreexpensive formats (quarto, large octavo) before the smaller and cheaper ones (smalloctavo, duodecimo etc.). While his study was widely welcomed, it remains that agreat deal more remains to be explored about the reading nation at this time, asreflected in the growing periodical market and among the individual choices recordedin innumerable personal manuscript anthologies. In The Enlightenment and the Scots,Richard Sher tackled some of the same issues, not always agreeing with St Clair.52

Illustration has aroused detailed interest only in some areas. While in my Print,manuscript and the search for order I addressed the phenomenon of manuscript andprinted illustration appearing side by side in some early books, Sachiko Kusukawahas addressed the rather wider question of sixteenth-century scientific book illustrationin her Picturing the book of nature (2012).53 In the seventeenth century, engravedillustration has recently attracted especial attention, particularly in the project led byMichael Hunter to compile a fully indexed digital library of British prints to 1700,including indexes to subject-matter.54 Unfortunately there is no archive in Britaincomparable to that of the Plantin press, on which Bowen and Imhof drew for theirpioneering investigation of the relationship between letterpress and intaglio.55Amongstudies of later periods, the appearance of Nigel Tattersfield's immense bibliographyof the wood engraver Thomas Bewick (1753-1828) set new standards in its attentionto archival sources and questions of attribution.56 In the twentieth century, interestin the design of dust-wrappers and other covers was reflected in Joseph Connolly onthose of Faber (dominated for many years by Berthold Wolpe, as the firm'stypographer) 57 and in Phil Baines on those of Penguin.58 The whole subject calls forextended analysis, but so far the only person to have written more generally and atlength about the history of book-jackets is the American scholar G. Thomas Tanselle.59

52 R.B. Sher, The Enlightenment and the Scots. Scottish authors and their publishers ineighteenth-century Britain, Ireland and America. Chicago 2006.

53 S. Kusukawa, Picturing the book of nature. Image, text and argument in sixteenth-centuryhuman anatomy and medical botany. Chicago 2012.

54 See www.bpi1700.org.uk. See alsoM. Hunter (ed.), Printed images in early modern Britain.Essays in interpretation. Farnham 2010.

55 K.L. Bowen, D. Imhof Christopher Plantin and engraved book illustrations insixteenth-century Europe. Cambridge 2008.

56 N. Tattersfield, Thomas Bewick. The complete illustrative work. 3 vols., London 2011.57 J. Connolly, Eighty years of book cover design. London 2009.58 Ph. Baines, Penguin by design. A cover story, 1935-2005. London 2005. See also Seven

hundred Penguins. London 2007.59 G.Th. Tanselle, Book-jackets. Their history, forms and use. Charlottesville 2011.


31

The dispersal of libraries

In the last few years, the management, and the dispersal, of some major libraries ofearly printed books has become a cause for concern. Partly, it reflects the crisis inlibrary funding that is common through much of the western world. Partly it reflectsvarious crises in institutional funding more generally, whether in universities, thechurches, or in societies. Partly also it reflects an increasing belief in the sufficiencyof scanned versions of books as being adequate both for immediate use and forlong-term preservation. So-called rationalisation of book stocks may help librarybudgets, but it always obscures the history of books. These are all long-term issues,and the effect of decisions taken now will affect public understanding of books forall time. So, for example, Keele University sold a substantial collection of books onthe history of science and mathematics, including books annotated by Sir IsaacNewton. Scandalously, in 2006 the diocese of Truro sold a major library of earlyprinted books including not only a copy of the Complutensian Polyglot Bible butalso a copy of Macklin's monumental edition of the Bible (1800) extra-illustrated ona unique scale, the inserted pictures bulking the original to no fewer than sixty-threevolumes. The set was dismantled, and the illustrations dispersed in the print trade.The rest of the library, mostly sent to a bookseller, was sold for very considerablyless than its true value, and the sale seems to have been done by the diocese withouttaking any serious professional advice. More cheerfully, when in 2008 the city ofCardiff decided to sell its historic collection from the public library, a campaignsuccessfully saw the books bought by the University of Cardiff helped substantiallywith a grant from theWelsh Assembly. The books, including a quantity of incunabulaand a collection of seventeenth-century English drama of exceptional importance,had been collected in the late nineteenth century on a scale that was intended to formthe core of a new National Library of Wales, and continued for a generation evenafter that Library was established on an entirely fresh site at Aberystwyth. Earlyreports suggest also that the provenances of many of the books, from early Welshlibraries, will substantially extend knowledge of the history of the use of books amongWelsh families. The gradual attrition of historic libraries, and with them the evidenceof book ownership and use, shows no sign of halting, and the tale is a mixed one.Many of the books from the Benedictine abbey of Fort Augustus, for example, arenow in the National Library of Scotland. The early books from Ushaw College, aRoman Catholic seminary with its roots in the sixteenth-century English College atDouai, are now under the umbrella of Durham University Library. But much of thelibrary of Cheshunt College, Cambridge, originally a nonconformist training college,was sold in 2012. Easily the most spectacular sale of this kind was that of theseventh-century manuscript of the Gospel of St John, from Stonyhurst, sold by theJesuit order in 2012 to the British Library for £9 million.Private libraries are a separate matter, but many people lamented the dispersal of

the library of the Earls of Macclesfield, one of the greatest of all private librariesformed mostly in the first half of the eighteenth century.60 An exceptional record ofhow New-tonianism and other traditions of natural philosophy were sustained,developed and shared, it can now never be studied in its entirety.

60 Most of it was sold in twelve sales at Sotheby's, 2004-8, after part had been retained by thefamily. Further books have since been offered by the booksellers Maggs Bros.


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A further look ahead

Looking ahead, what further work is needed, and where can we expect interests todevelop? Computer-based projects such as CERL, the ISTC and the UniversalShort-Title Catalogue being developed at St Andrew's University draw daily attentionto the international nature of the subject. In the last few pages, some lines of enquiry- both international and insular - have already been suggested. Most importantly, theprimacy of the printed artefact as evidence stands as a reminder to librarians andscholars alike of the importance of its maintenance, preservation and study. Howmuch can we afford to throw away? As our world grows ever more dependent onthe Web and other kinds of non-print environments, so it becomes ever more urgentto understand a medium that in the course of over five hundred years becamedominant, but that was never a monopoly. How has print related to speech, the wordto image, verbal language to the language of signs? First, we need to develop ourknowledge of the extent to which print penetrated many aspects of society in waysof which we are so far largely ignorant. While great strides have been made insearching family, ecclesiastical, legal and business archives, the largest relevantquestion remains. What has been lost? What kinds of documents (not simply whatbooks) have been lost? How many copies were printed, of books, and of moreephemeral publications such as notices, advertisements, licences, catalogues?Quantification is taking a more central role, and it has the potential to informpresent-day challenges concerning preservation as well as our understanding of thepast, and what was meant by the power of print. Second, and related to the first: forsome scholars, this is a question that is centered on books. William St Clair (a formercivil servant in the Treasury) has suggested that ESTC records could be linked toarchival records so as to produce the beginning of a census of production: such aproject would require considerable care in its detail, if false trails and false links areto be avoided. These same archival records provide some of our best evidence ofwhat has either completely, or almost, disappeared. Third, how do new books relateto old ones, and how does this relationship change? Fourth, how has the book tradeworked - locally, nationally, internationally - and how has it changed over more thanfive centuries? Fifth, what is print for? Here, a growing interest in the history ofinformation by Asa Briggs, Peter Burke and others suggests a new stress on therelationship between print and other forms of communication.61 Most of these andother questions addressed above require international outlooks.

61 A. Briggs, P. Burke, A social history of the media from Gutenberg to the Internet. 3rd ed.,Cambridge 2009; P. Burke, A social history of knowledge. 2 vols., Cambridge 2000-12. Forwork in a key part of the British Empire, see C. Bayly, Empire and information. Intelligencegathering and social communication in India, 1780-1870. Cambridge 1996.


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Roger OsborneTaking turns in AustralasiaHistories of the book in Australia and New Zealand

With the rise of book history elsewhere, the last two decades in Australia and NewZealand has seen a sharp increase in studies of books and other printed forms assignificant mediums of cultural transmission. This is reflected most clearly in a seriesof book-length studies that established the foundations of the field in Australia andNew Zealand, directing attention to the work that needs to be done in order to developa better understanding of print culture, more broadly. So far, the bulk of thisunderstanding has been built on analyses of extant archival evidence which focus onthe construction of histories bounded by national and, perhaps, nationalistic discourses.Such discourses have attracted criticism in recent years from advocates oftrans-national histories that position Australian and New Zealand cultural productionin a global frame. This has occurred in step with the development of nationalbibliographical databases and other digitisation initiatives, energising the study ofbook history in Australia and New Zealand with a computational turn that promisesto challenge and extend the field by presenting large-scale alternatives to themicro-studies that have dominated the field to date. To suggest how this mightinfluence the way book history is done in Australia and New Zealand in the nextdecade, this essay reflects on the major volumes devoted to the history of the bookin Australia and New Zealand, it summarises a selection of essays that respond tothe national and empirical foundations of the field, and it considers themethodologicaland theoretical challenges posed by new studies that draw on trans-national themesand computational methods.As a discipline, the history of the book in Australia and New Zealand has been

served by a series of publications that began in the 1990s and continue to this day.The first broad summary came from New Zealand in 1997 with the volume, Bookand print in New Zealand. A guide to print culture in Aotearoa,1 an ‘extendedbibliographical essay’ that ‘sketched an outline of local book trades, reading habits,institutional practices, and cognate activities in New Zealand, at the same time as itgave an overview of existing

1 P. Griffith [et al.] (eds.), Book and print in New Zealand. A guide to print culture in Aotearoa.Wellington 1997; nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-GriBook.html. See also: P. Griffith[et al.] (eds.), A book in the hand: essays on the history of the book in New Zealand.Wellington 2000; nzetc.victoria.ac.nz/tm/scholarly/tei-GriHand.html.


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research and gestured towards important gaps.’2 Studies such as these are currentlybeing reassessed with plans for an updated multi-volume history of the book in NewZealand at the Centre for the Book at the University of Otago. Australia soon followedwith several volumes in its national series. The first volume, A history of the bookin Australia, 1891-1945. A national culture in a colonised market, appeared in 2000,and the second, Paper empires. A history of the book in Australia: 1946-2005, waspublished in 2006.Making books. Contemporary Australian publishing, complementsthese volumes by concentrating on the years since 1990.3 This first wave of researchactivity and publishing established the field of book history in the region, and directedattention to untouched archival records that contribute significantly to ourunderstanding of Australian and New Zealand culture.

Figure 1. Book and Print in New Zealand, 1997

2 S.J. Shep, ‘Books without borders. The transnational turn in book history’, in: R. Fraser, M.Hammond (eds.), Books without borders. The cross-national dimension in print culture.Basingstoke 2008, 21-22.

3 M. Lyons, J. Arnold (eds.), A history of the book in Australia, 1891-1945. A national culturein a colonised market. St Lucia 2001; C. Munro, R. Sheahan-Bright (eds.), Paper empires.A history of the book in Australia, 1946-2005. St Lucia 2006; D. Carter, A. Galligan (eds.),Making books. Contemporary Australian publishing. St Lucia 2007.


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Figure 2. A history of the book in Australia, 1891-1945, 2000

These publications were made possible by a strong network of researchers whohave gathered regularly at conferences devoted to the history of the book since 1994.Taking over from earlier seminars held in conjunction with events such as the annualBibliographical Society of Australia and New Zealand conference, the first Historyof the Book in Australia conference was held at the State Library of New SouthWales in August 1996. This continued annually until 1999, providing a venue forresearchers to present early versions of work that would eventually appear in thepublished volumes mentioned above.4

The ‘Australia’ in the title of these conferences was always flexible. The proximityof New Zealand and the close connections between the print cultures of both countriesprovided opportunities for New Zealand researchers to test out the histories theywere writing at the time. The Books and Empire conference hosted by the Universityof Sydney in 2003 was followed by similarly themed conferences at Wellington(2005), Kolkata (2006), and Cape Town (2007). These were organised as regionalconferences under the auspices of the Society for the History of Authorship, Readingand Publishing (SHARP), a practice that most recently saw a conference devoted to‘The Long Twentieth Century’ hosted in Brisbane in April 2012. Presenters at thesefoundational conferences

4 The programs, abstracts and, sometimes, full papers from these conferences have beencollected on the Australian Scholarly Editions Centre website:hass.unsw.adfa.edu.au/ASEC/HOBA.html.


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have come from diverse backgrounds, providing a variety of perspectives on bookhistory and the main fields of authorship, reading and publishing. Academics fromEnglish, media studies, cultural studies, economics and history departments haveregularly mixed with professional librarians, archivists, booksellers, publisher'seditors, and others from the publishing industry.The following pages provide a brief survey of the major themes that have emerged

from these foundational studies. This will demonstrate where the first wave of bookhistory in Australia and New Zealand is currently positioned, and support mysuggestions for the new directions that should follow in the near future.

Authorship

Government intervention in the form of grants and subsidies has relieved the livesof some authors, but the fact remains that, like most places in the world, making aliving from writing in Australia and New Zealand has never been easy. Because ofthe limited opportunities for Australian and New Zealand authors to see their workpublished in book form, many have looked to overseas publication first, or they havepublished their work in local magazines and newspapers. But none of these methodsguaranteed an enduring success in a fickle marketplace, and for many years theroyalty rates for colonial authors published in Britain was half the going rate forEnglish writers at home. Our understanding of the conditions of authorship has beenlargely based on evidence from the papers of prominent authors and their associatedpublishers, but this has been tempered by recent studies of popular authors fromoutside the canon. Significant numbers of authors travelled overseas to further theirwriting careers, creating large expatriate communities, particularly in London.5

Since the first half of the twentieth century there have been many attempts toestablish organisations that represent the rights of authors on a regional and nationalscale, but the last fifty years has seen an increased professionalism in the businessof writing with the formation of groups such as the Australian Society of Authors(1963) and the New Zealand Writer's Guild (1975). Even still, the average annualincome of Australian writers continues to hover around $12,000, and the vast majorityof writers rely on income from other sources such as teaching in order to continuewriting. As recent research has shown, the idea of Australian and New Zealandauthorship necessarily extends beyond national boundaries to intersect most strikinglywith the print culture of Great Britain and the United States of America. Indeed,writers such as Tim Winton have openly declared the importance to their livelihoodof these separate markets.6 The cultural and professional intersections that Australianand New Zealand authorship

5 For example, see D. Adelaide, ‘How did authors make a living?’, in: Lyons, Arnold, A historyof the book in Australia; and R. Somerville, ‘Author and publisher , in: Griffith, Harvey,Maslen, Book and print in New Zealand, 88-91.

6 T. Winton, ‘Productivity commission parallel importation of books: a submission by TimWinton’, 2009; www.pc.gov.au/-data/assets/pdf-file/0006/85731/sub204.pdf (accessed 29September 2012); also atwww.docstoc.com/docs/43969777/Productivity-Commission-Parallel-Importation-of-Books.


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has had with other national book histories complicates the idea of what an Australianor a New Zealand book is.

Publishing

The history of publishing in Australia and New Zealand is dominated by themes thatforeground the tension between the influence of imperial connections and concertedattempts to shape a national literary culture within and against those connections.7

Australia and New Zealand have been Britain's largest export market for books andother cultural material and this has had a significant effect on the local industry atevery level. Local publishers are often deservedly regarded as saviours of a nationalliterature that is either unacceptable to dominant, imperial competitors, or is underthreat of dilution through publication and delivery to a more general overseas market.Publishers who have prevailed under such conditions are described in case studiesin many of the publications listed above.8

These case studies range from short sketches based on limited external evidence tolarger case studies such as one on Angus and Robertson that has since supported abook-length study.9 In New Zealand, long-lived publishers such as Whitcombe andTombs and Reed, both established in the nineteenth century, have had book-lengthstudies devoted to them.10 Editors and other prominent figures in publishing are givenshort biographical notices, and, in the most recent volume of Australian book history,Paper empires, short memoirs from such figures are included, building up anencyclopedic network of reference points for future study.11 As we come to knowmore about the place of Australian and New Zealand culture in multi-nationalnetworks of publication and distribution, it will be important to reflect on the waysin which we have recorded the history of Australian authorship and publishing.Despite attempts to limit the movement of books into Australia with tariffs and otherrestrictions, Australia and NewZealand have always been subject to muchmore thana national culture.

Readers and reading

7 In particular, see M. Lyons, ‘Britain's largest export market’, in: Lyons, Arnold, A historyof the book in Australia, 19-26.

8 For example, see C. Munro, ‘P.R. Stephensen’, in: Lyons, Arnold, A history of the book inAustralia, 60-63; the case-studies in: Munro, Sheahan-Bright, Paper empires, 31-52; and R.Somerville, ‘The publishers’, in: Griffith [et. al.], Book and print in New Zealand, 104-11.

9 J. Alison, Doing something for Australia. George Robertson and the early years of Angusand Robertson, publishers 1888-1900. Melbourne 2009.

10 See A. Preston, ‘Bookselling’, in: Griffith [et. al.], Book and print in New Zealand, 157-67.11 See F. Thompson, ‘Sixties larrikins’, in: Munro, Sheahan-Bright, Paper empires, 31-52.


The position of Australia and New Zealand as consumers of culture beyond theirown national products is clearly seen in the studies of reading that have beenconducted


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since the 1990s. The pioneering studies of Martyn Lyons and Lucy Taksa have madeway for more nuanced studies of reading groups and the analysis of library holdings.12

Our understanding of Australian and New Zealand readers and their reading practiceshas often been inferred from the records of libraries and bookshops, but direct attentionto readers has been limited. Martyn Lyons' interviews have partially filled that gapby adding the memories and opinions of elderly Australians about family readingand borrowing habits. This has been supplemented by many other analyses ofindividual libraries or examinations of literary societies and organised readingcommunities. Initiatives to gather data on a large scale have been conducted byseveral scholars. The Australian CommonReader database gathers borrowing recordsof a number of schools of arts and mechanic's institutes, supporting at least one articlethat attempts to look at this from a distance.13 Australia and New Zealand are alsoworking towards their own versions of the Reading ExperienceDatabase,14 an initiativethat will gather more first hand knowledge of direct reading experiences.

Bookshops and libraries

With great distances between towns and cities, the efficient distribution of books inAustralia and New Zealand has required highly organised institutional and personalnetworks. Study of bookshops and libraries has been limited by a dearth of archives,but the fragments that survive in collections across Australia and New Zealandprovide a good idea of the reading material that was available in small towns and incities.15 For many Australians, the local school of arts or mechanic's institute librarywas the primary source of reading material. While the improvement of the localpopulation was at the centre of a library committee's motivations, surviving recordsclearly show that library patrons demanded popular fiction. Other institutions suchas the many Workers Educational Associations or the New South Wales RailwayInstitute mixed a strong collection of material aimed at improving members, but evenin this context British and American popular fiction was a steady diet. Personallibraries have also attracted attention, providing further insight into the reading habitsof individual families and small communities.16

The histories and archives of bookshops provide contexts into which differenttypes of readers and reading can be placed. An understanding of bookshops andbooksellers in

12 M. Lyons, L. Taksa, Australian readers remember: an oral history of reading, 1890-1930.Melbourne 1992.

13 See www.australiancommonreader.com (accessed 26 September 2012). For an analysis ofthis database, see J. Lamond, M. Reid, ‘Squinting at a sea of dots: visualising Australianreaderships using statistical machine learning’, in: K. Bode, R. Dixon (eds.), Resourcefulreading: the new empiricism, eResearch and Australian literary culture. Sydney 2009,223-239.

14 See: www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/.15 For example, see A. Bremer and M. Lyons, ‘Mechanics' institute libraries - the readers

demand fiction’, in: Lyons, Arnold, A history of the book in Australia, 209-225; and B.McKeon, ‘Libraries’, in: Griffith [et al.], Book and print in New Zealand, 168-96.

16 For an accessible record of the contents and borrowing of such libraries see The AustralianCommon Reader database: www.australiancommonreader.com/.


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the region is greatly assisted by publications such as the Booksellers stationers andfancy goods journal of Australia and New Zealand, Australasian bookseller andpublisher, and All about books.17 With advice about how to display books and whatsort of books to stock for particular readers, these publications are an understudiedresource.18 Histories of radical bookshops have demonstrated the types of readingmaterial available to members of radical sub-cultures. More salubrious institutionslike Dymock's Bookshop in Sydney and E.W. Coles in Melbourne provided a spaceto meet socially just as much to purchase or borrow books.19 The examination of thehistory and partial archives of such bookshops provide a useful portrait, but evidenceof sales and effectiveness often have to be taken with a grain of salt. Since 2002,however, students of bookselling in Australia have been assisted by data providedby Bookscan, a more reliable counter of bookmovements, but not open to everybodyfor analysis.20

Perspectives on book history in Australia and New Zealand

The histories briefly described above have completed the first wave of book historyresearch in Australia and New Zealand. This research has been influenced by extantmaterial evidence that ultimately reflects the collection policies of local, regionaland national archives. Now that the groundwork has been laid and the first maps ofthe field are available for scrutiny and critique, the absences, inaccuracies, andlop-sided concentrations have become evident. Recent years have seen an increasein stocktaking activities and reassessments of the role book history plays incontributions to our knowledge of national cultures. The following pages take accountof several positions in this period of reassessment in order to best account for themany ‘turns’ that are currently affecting the field of book history and print culturein Australia and New Zealand.David Carter, professor of Australian literature and cultural history at the University

of Queensland, sounded one of the first significant reassessments, influenced by theongoing transition from theory-driven analyses, and the rise of a so-called newempiricism with its exploration of digital methods of enquiry.21 For Carter, this shiftencourages researchers to look beyond histories based on monolithic works ofliterature and towards the institutions that make the production and consumption of

17 Established inMelbourne and edited by D.W. Thorpe, these publications includedBooksellersstationers and fancy goods journal of Australia and New Zealand, Australasian booksellerand publisher, All about books, ideas and Australian bookseller and publisher, ranging from1921 to the present day.

18 David Carter has demonstrated the benefits of this approach in his ‘“Some means of learningof the best new books”: All About Books and the modern reader’, in: Australian literarystudies 22 (2006) 3, 329-341.

19 For New Zealand, see A. Preston, ‘Bookselling’, in: Griffith [et al.], Book and print in NewZealand, 157-167.

20 Nevertheless, some studies have drawn on Book Scan data, including Jan Zwar's report fromher PhD thesis, ‘Conceptualising Australian Nonfiction Publishers and Readers in the 2000s,’paper delivered at ‘The Long Twentieth Century SHARP Brisbane’ conference, 2011.

21 D. Carter, ‘Structures, networks, institutions: the new empiricism, book history and literaryhistory’, in: Bode, Dixon, Resourceful reading, 31-52.


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cultural objects possible. Accepting a broader view forces researchers to reconsiderthe object of study, and Carter asks, ‘Is the object of our research still literature oris it books, publishing or print culture. Is what we're doing still literary history or isit book history, the history of reading, or something else again - the history of culturesor subjectivities?’22 For Carter, the most productive way to proceed in a field thatexists at the ‘intersections of literary studies, critical theory and more empiricallyinflected kinds of book or print culture studies’ is with a method that ‘can best bedescribed as agnostic towards literature.’23 This enables the prolific author of pulpfiction to be compared with the critically acclaimed but commercially unsuccessfulauthor, each contributing to the positioning of forms and genres within a culturalfield that tends to situate popular works at an opposite pole to literary works. Becauseof Australia's participation in transnational culture, Carter argues for ‘a history that'splayed across three intersecting scales - the history of Australian literature, the historyof literature in Australia, and the history of book or print in (or “through”) Australiansociety.’24 Such a project necessarily looks beyond ideas of nation, requiringresearchers in disciplines such as literary studies and cultural history to performmuchmore of the ‘boundary work’ advocated by Robert Dixon.25

The shift towards networks, institutions and structures has been counterbalancedby views that maintain an interest in the micro-study because of fears that importantaesthetic questions will be displaced or silenced by broader cultural questions. Inarguing for reengagement with the concept of the literary ‘work’, Paul Eggert,Australian Research Council Professorial Fellow, suggests that creating a dichotomyof overarching book-historical explanations and particularist case study ‘leaves theliterary exactly where it was: that is, unattended to.’26 In contrast to Carter's directionof energy towards contributions to cultural history, Eggert argues for the necessityto ‘configure a conjunction of bibliography and book history in the study ofliterature.’27 Using Henry Lawson's short story collectionWhile the Billy Boils as acase-study, Eggert demonstrates that the ‘textual versions, bibliographical formats,and biographical and book-historical positionings’ of Lawson's collection of shortstories ‘can be seen to have acted as a gauge of successive formations of Australianculture from the 1890s until the 1970s, sometimes indeed as a lightning rod ofdisputation.’28 The results of such an approach show the benefits of a closeexamination of a single work over time, particularly canonical works that continueto find a place in the culture of different periods. Far from being ‘agnostic towardsliterature’, this approach positions the frame of enquiry directly on the material ofliterary works and those people who bring the work to life through

22 Carter, ‘Structures’, 34.23 Ibidem, 34-35.24 Ibidem, 51.25 R. Dixon, ‘Boundary work: Australian literary studies in the field of knowledge production’,

in: Journal of the association for the study of Australian literature 3 (2004), 27-43.26 P. Eggert, ‘Brought to book: bibliography, book history and the study of literature’, in: The

library 13 (2012) 1, 14.27 Ibidem, 17.28 Ibidem, 27.


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reading. Quoting D.F. McKenzie, Eggert reminds us that ‘no book was ever boundby its covers. The book, in all its forms, enters history only as evidence of humanbehavior, and it remains active only in the service of human needs’.29

The ‘shifting frames’ of enquiry advocated by Carter are also supported byKatherine Bode in the first book-length study of Australia's literary history and bookhistory using quantitative methods.30 Bode, Head of the Digital Humanities Hub atthe Australian National University, agrees with those who argue that no amount ofindividual case studies will completely fill the field of enquiry with absolutestatements of truth, but she also questions claims of complete knowledge producedby the ‘distant reading’ of large sets of data. In her study of publishing trends innineteenth and twentieth centuries, her critiques of feminist arguments about thestatus of female authorship, and her revisions of literary history by expanding thefield of enquiry to include works of popular fiction, Bode draws on the growingbibliographical dataset that is being compiled in the long-running AustLit project.31

Bode's is not the only study that has used AustLit data to support distant reading ofAustralian literary history,32 but it is the first to adequately theorise the place of suchmethods in contemporary scholarship.Bode exercises caution in making statements about literary history extracted from

the statistical analysis of AustLit data, pointing to the inevitable gaps in suchlarge-scale projects and the subsequent partiality of the visualisations that suchmethods provide. Nevertheless, she follows Jonathan Zwicker's argument thatquantitative methods ‘make accessible - through patterns and series - solutions toproblems that are virtually inaccessible through the methods of traditional literaryhistory.’33 The results of quantitative analysis are indications rather than proof ofliterary historical trends and so scholars are encouraged to followWillard McCarty'sadvice to pursue research programs that facilitate ‘modelling’ rather than to pursuethe unachievable end of an absolute ‘model.’ For Bode, modeling is explicitlycontingent and speculative, but, she argues, so are traditional methods that are limitedby the fragmentation and subjectivity of the archival record.34 The material archiveis not rendered obsolete by digital methods, rather, it enhances its value by directingattention to those elements that have relevance from a quantitative point of view. Inmany cases, these elements will produce new knowledge rather than a critique of theold, providing new ways to answer old questions and fresh directions for futurestudies of Australian literary and book history.The use of book history in the service of cultural history or literary history as

encouraged by those mentioned above introduces facets of book history that are

29 D.F. McKenzie,Oral culture, literacy and print in early New Zealand: the Treaty of Waitangi.Wellington 1985, 45; originally published in The library 6th series 6 (1984) 4, 333-365.

30 K. Bode, Reading by numbers: recalibrating the literary field. London 2012.31 www.austlit.edu.au (accessed 29 September 2012). AustLit is a bibliographical database of

Australian creative writing that aims to be the definitive virtual research environment andinformation resource for Australian literary, print, and narrative culture scholars, students,and the public.

32 For example see J. Ensor, ‘Is a picture worth 10,175 Australian novels’, in: Bode, Dixon,Resourceful reading, 240-273.

33 Zwicker, ‘Japan, 1850-1900’, in: F. Moretti (ed.), The novel. Volume 1: History, geographyand culture. Princeton 2006, 514.

34 Bode, Reading by numbers, 8.


further nuanced by the so-called trans-national turn in book history. The first waveof founda-


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tional studies laid the groundwork for a reassessment of the national in the contextof international or transnational studies. Acknowledging that the first wave of‘national’ book history is partly influenced by the collection policies of the archivesavailable to researchers and the funding incentives from governments that encouragedetailed examinations of distinct national traits, Sydney Shep argues that the historiesthat have come out of such debates are frequently seen as closed ‘monumental’products rather than ongoing modes of enquiry that open up debate. But, without areassessment of the ‘imagined communities’ that have informed the construction ofthe ideas of nation and nationhood in recent book history, new knowledge will bestymied. To emphasise this point, Shep quotes Shef Rogers, who argues:

[W]e as print culture historians in commonwealth countries have an ethicalobligation to avoid or at the very least question nationalistic structures forour discipline, and should actively pursue models that seek more to createinternational connections than to construct an apparent national history asa means of affirming a country's cultural independence.35

If we are to embrace the nationalistic histories of the book that have emerged in thefirst wave of research activity and acknowledge the transnational nature of books,book historians of the near future will have to closely consider the ‘high mobility,ethnic diversity, and fragmented skill sets’ of settler societies like Australia and NewZealand.36

What follows is a discussion that aims to demonstrate the reach of transnationalbook history, using G.B. Lancaster's Pageant as an example. This will reveal thetransnational networks at play in the life and career of a migratory writer who reliedon the transmission of literary property to earn a living from her work. Themicrohistory can be complemented by a much broader macrohistory that draws ondata that is becoming more accessible and more manipulable in the computationalturn of humanities research. Combined, these two case studies suggest futuredirections and possibilities for book history in Australia and New Zealand, historiesthat examinemuch broader inter-cultural relations, transfers and exchanges in projectsthat will need to embrace collaboration and group authorship.

35 S.J. Shep, ‘Imagining post-national book history’, in: Papers of the BibliographicalSociety of America 104 (2010) 2, 34, quoting S. Rogers, ‘Colonising the field of bookhistory in post-colonial Commonwealth countries,’ discussion paper presented to first[and last] meeting of CAHL [Canadian Association of l'Histoire du Livre], Vancouver,15 July 1998.

36 Shep, ‘Books without borders’, 265.


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Case study 1: G.B. Lancaster's Pageant and the limits of trans-nationalpublication

G.B. Lancaster is the pseudonym of Edith Lyttleton (1873-1945), the Australian-born,New Zealand-raised international traveller and prolific author of magazine storiesand novels. In October 1934, at a meeting of the Australian Literature Society,Lancaster's best-selling novel, Pageant (1933), was awarded the Society's GoldMedal for best Australian novel of the previous year. The novel had achievedoutstanding success in Great Britain and the United States of America, enjoyingselection by both the English Book Society and the American Literary Guild as theirbook of the month. Indeed, the first edition of this Australian novel was American.Selection by book clubs guaranteed significant sales and prompted a wide exposure

that influenced sales in bookshops, pushing the American Century edition to fifteenthousand copies and the English Allen and Unwin edition towards bestseller status.An Australian edition, published by the Bulletin-backed Endeavour Press, sold sixthousand copies. But the resounding critical and commercial success of the novelconcealed strong divisions in the negotiations between the author and three publishers,divisions exacerbated firstly by the trade restrictions of international copyright lawsand the Traditional Markets Agreement, and secondly by the income tax reportingrequirements of four countries. The American, English, and Australian editions ofPageant were produced for three separate book markets and reading cultures, butthey are inexorably linked by the networks of a trans-national book trade, and thecontractual agreements made between the author and her publishers.Any study of G.B. Lancaster's fiction is indebted to the pioneering work of Terry

Sturm whose account of the author's career provides a unique insight into the life ofa professional author in the first half of the twentieth century.37 Sturm has tracedLyttleton's career from her success in the British and American magazine marketthrough her accomplishments as a writer of fast-paced popular novels set in thecolonial areas of Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Canada. At the heightof her success in the early 1920s, Lyttleton earned as much as £50 for an eightthousand word short story, more than she could expect to receive for a novel thatsold anything less than 12,000 copies. Her fiction wasmuch in demand by the editorsof England's main magazines and she often had trouble meeting this demand. ForEnglishmagazines, Lyttleton set her stories in Fiji, Hawai, NewGuinea and elsewhere.But her success was rocked by the death of her mother and sister in quick

succession in the mid 1920s, and her production of stories dried up during the late1920s. But the hiatus from professional writing allowed her to revisit her family rootsand reassess the type of fiction she wanted to write. Out of this period emerged plansfor Pageant and thoughts for similar treatment of the New Zealand and Canadianpast. But, starting again as an author in an uncertain and competitive market meantbeing subjected to the legal and institutional restrictions of the international booktrade. As a publishing gamble, a book by a forgotten author set in Australia attractedlong odds, and so the

37 T. Sturm, An unsettled spirit: the life and frontier fiction of Edith Lyttleton (G.B. Lancaster).Auckland 2003.


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Century Company looked for the most satisfactory agreement for their bottom line.As the first publisher, world rights gave them more power in the negotiations inwhich the Traditional Markets Agreement (TMA)38 was a factor.Existing as an agreement between gentlemen publishers, and formalised in 1947,

the TMA created two distinct markets: one for British publishers that included themajor countries and cities of the Empire; and one for the United States of Americathat included the Americas and the Philippines in addition to themain national market.Exporting books directly to England was out of the question and so securing worldrights gave the Century Company the bargaining power they needed to make themost of the literary property they had acquired fromEdith Lyttleton. Tensions betweenAustralian and New Zealand publishers and British publishers over Australasianrights further complicated the transaction, pushing the author further to the backgroundof negotiations of the literary property.The contract for the publication of Pageant was signed on 29 July 1932, locking

in a number of standard conditions, but also locking in conditions that gave theCentury Company significant control of the literary property. Edith Lyttleton regrettedthis arrangement for the rest of her life, because it stripped her of any power todetermine the fate of Pageant in the world market and it stripped her of a largeproportion of the profit from the book's publication. Lyttleton's advance and royaltieswas boosted by income from the Literary Guild, which paid three thousand dollarsfor 33,000 copies, and the British rights were sold to Allen and Unwin. Allen andUnwin eventually negotiated to sell Australian rights to Sydney's Endeavour Presswith the stipulation that the British publisher retained all rights for publication inNew Zealand. Following the contract for Pageant, this income was to be dividedequally between the Century Company and the author. But, hidden behind thesearrangements were the taxes each publisher was obligated to retain within their ownjurisdictions. After English and American taxes, publishers' fees and her agent'scommission, Edith Lyttleton received less than 30% of the royalties produced.This example provides a crude, economic model of the effects of a migratory

author publishing the same work in several national markets. The real and imaginedboundaries of national markets control the movements of books and extend the ideaof authorship and the idea of the work into distinct events that are joined by a myriadof personal, cultural and institutional networks. Case-studies like this one that drawon the material archive to reveal the human agents involved in the production anddistribution of books provide a preface to a much larger exploration of the dynamicsof the networks that make up the book trades that intersect with Australian and NewZealand book history. But, to date, we have been unable to see how this dynamismexists. The following pages suggest ways in which this might be done.

38 The best account of this agreement is Mary Nell Bryant, ‘English language publication andthe British Traditional Market Agreement’, in: Library quarterly 49 (1979) 4, 371-398.


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Case study 2: American publishers and trans-national publishing networks

In contrast to the Lancaster case study which was driven by archival research inlibraries in several countries that included first-hand retrieval, viewing and analysisof material documents, a more distant view of trans-national publishing networkscan be visualised by exploiting bibliographical data created by databases such asAustLit. The structures and networks that emerged in the example of G.B. Lancastershow the human actions involved in the production, sale and consumption of literaryworks of art. The identification and description of these networks rely on the recordsand correspondence saved in the archive, a situation that, at best, only occurs witha few authors. Gaps in the record have to be filled with a scholar's speculation orargument based on comparison with similar cases, but, in effect, the narrative thatforms is never conclusive and awaits augmentation or correction by subsequentresearch and discovery. Zooming out from a micro-study to consider the broaderfield can provide some assistance, but, to date, the resources and methods to do thishave not been available or exploited to their fullest extent. To demonstrate thepotential for looking at structures and networks on a large scale, the following pagesconsider evidence drawn from AustLit data that supports the visualization ofrelationships between Australian authors and American publishers.

Figure 3. Detail of a visualisation of relationships between Australian authors and American publishers


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For a project that aims to explore the publication of Australian novels in the UnitedStates of America to the end of the twentieth century, a spreadsheet of authors,publications, publishers, dates, and other information provides information on morethan 2,500 novels over more than one hundred and fifty years.39 This allows rawnumbers to be graphed, but it also allows for an examination of the strength ofrelationships between authors and their publishers in the United States of America.40

For instance, the network visualisation in figure 3 displays a detailed view of therelationships between Australian authors and American publishers for the years1840-2010. The major publishers emerge, and the size of St Martin's Press reflectsits status as a reprint publisher. The productivity of authors also emerges. Figure 4shows the intense concentration of activity around the New York-based publishersWilliam Morrow and Doubleday, reflecting the long association of Morris West,Nevil Shute and Jon Cleary with the former and Arthur Upfield with the latter. Prolificwriters of pulp fiction such as Maysie Greig and Carter Brown also display intenseconcentrations, leveling the field so that books and authors of all persuasions jostlefor position. This then provides a backdrop against which fine-grained analyses ofthe material archive can be discussed. While not conclusive, it provides a temporarymodel of the larger field in order to support and encourage enquiry.

Figure 4. Detail of a visualisation of relationships between Australian authors and American publishers

39 Funded by the Australian Research Council, David Carter's ‘America publishes Australia:Australian books and American publishers, 1840-2010’ will soon reach its conclusion in abook-length study.

40 The network visualisations discussed here were created using data extracted from AustLitand Gephi, an open source graph visualisation and manipulation software: gephi.org/.


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Visualising how Australian books are positioned in relation to Australian authors,publishers and others is a new method of enquiry that will be supported by thecontinued development and openness of the AustLit database and other digitalinitiatives in Australia and New Zealand. Continuing digitisation of Australian andNew Zealand newspapers is opening up the archive to questions and queries andsupporting visualisations of trends over time. These digitisation projects are helpingto uncover information about authorship, reading and publishing that until now hasremained locked in the material archive. This openness will not only lead to newanswers to old questions, but it will also lead to new questions.

Prospects

In the coming years, the results of several large-scale studies will emerge, but theywill be augmented, and perhaps challenged by the results of analyses of thevisualisation of data.41 It will be important to keep these competing models of enquiryin balance in order to get the best out of both methods, and it will be important tomake sure that material and digital methods of enquiry contribute to the samediscourses in order for constructive criticism to proceed. With short book histories,small populations, and digital initiatives that continue to open up the archives toanalysis, Australia and New Zealand are poised to enter a second wave of bookhistory that will be increasingly collaborative, trans-national and digital.

41 For example, ‘Australian literary publishing and its economies, 1965-1995,’ directed by IvorIndyk at the University of Western Sydney.


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49

Frederick NestaThe book in China and modern Western book history

Like the book in China, the study of the Chinese book has a long history ofbibliography, analysis, and investigation. Until fairly recently, Chinese book historywas primarily the domain of scholars in China, Japan, and the regions around Chinathat used Chinese characters for their own literature. AlthoughWestern appreciationof Chinese book culture dates back at least to Matteo Ricci's discovery at the end ofthe sixteenth century of the ease and efficiency of Chinese printing, full-fledgedstudies by Westerners did not begin until Carter's study in the 1920s, followed byNeedham in the 1950s.1 From the 1980s onwards and using the broader fields ofstudy of book history developed by Bourdieu2 and others, Chinese book history inthe West has moved beyond bibliography and textual analysis into the studies of thesocial, economic, cultural, and technical aspects that underlie the existence of booksas objects. Modern book history methods and concepts are still not yet part of bookculture studies in China itself. There, studies are still concerned with bibliographies,text analysis, catalogues, and recreations of ancient texts. Translations of some keymodernWestern works in Chinese book history are only just now appearing in Chinaand these may help to encourage wider studies within China that will apply thesenew techniques and perspectives.Europeans may wonder why xylography lasted so long in China. Perhaps a better

question is why xylography did not have any significant impact in Europe in thehundreds of years before Gutenberg's press. In both cases I think the answer is in thediffering markets and economies of China and Europe. China's millennia-oldbureaucracy with equalitarian access through examinations provided a market forbooks and helped to develop a book culture for classical and secular texts. TheEuropean universities that developed from the eleventh century could satisfy demandby the circulation of manuscripts. The European printing revolution of the fifteenthcentury was - like that of the Chinese of the nineteenth - dependent on having amarket to sell to and the capital to purchase (or rent) the type and presses. Xylographyallowed printing to be done in places like rural Jianyang where bamboo for paperwas plentiful and roads and rivers

1 T.F. Carter, The invention of printing in China and its spread westward. 2nd ed., New York1955; J. Needham, Science and civilisation in China. 7 vols., Cambridge 1954-1998.

2 P. Bourdieu, The field of cultural production: essays on art and literature. New York 1993.


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gave access to the outside. Movable type printing required printers to be near capitaland intellectual markets and in urban centres where the distribution of large numbersof newspapers and books would be economical.Xylography could satisfy an extensive market of hundreds of thousands. Wood

blocks could print about 5,000 copies before they would need to be refurbished orrecut. Xylography simply was not able to reach the millions that the Westernmissionaries wanted to reach or that the large commercial publishers of Shanghaidid reach in the years after the introduction of new demand into China. The focus ofthis chapter will be on Western scholarship, since it is accessible to those who donot read Chinese and because its broader scope allows for some comparison toWestern print culture.

Figure 2. Woodblock carving required simple tools

Scholars and woodblock printing

The cultural differences between China and the West are quite apparent in Chineseprint culture. In Europe the watershed point for book history is the middle of thefifteenth century, when Gutenberg developed movable type, cheapening the costs ofbook production for publishers, book acquisition for readers, and giving authors alarger audience. China's history is far older. Not only did China enjoy the advantagesof low-cost printing centuries before Europe, but the Chinese also had a cheaperalternative to papyrus and vellum. Paper did not appear in theWest until the thirteenthcentury, centuries after it had been invented in China. Attributed to Cai Lun in thesecond century, paper made from bamboo or other fibres replaced the earlier Chinesemedia writing on bamboo slips or silk fabric. Printing in China developed in the ninthcentury. Based on woodblock printing, eminently suitable for a character-basedlanguage, it relied on a technology that was far cheaper than European movable typeprinting.Movable type printing in China, using clay type in a wax frame, was inventedin the middle of the eleventh century and attributed to Bi Sheng (990-1051). Becauseof the complexity and


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number of Chinese characters, movable type was too expensive for widespreadadoption.

Figure 3. A page from the Diamond Sutra, the earliest dated printed book, printed in 868

Producing a woodblock text required little in the way of capital or even of skill:carvers need not be literate but had only to follow the outlines left on the block, and,like European stereotype plates, the blocks were reusable, tradable, and transportable.Although early woodblock printing was for short devotional texts and talismans, itwas soon extended to longer texts in every field. China's early and extensivebureaucracy and the examination system that screened candidates to fill it requireda large and literate population that in turn needed affordable texts to prepare for theexaminations. Begun in the early seventh century and lasting until it was abolishedin 1905, the examination system was expanded during the Song Dynasty (960-1279)so that China was governed by cadres of scholars who came from every strata ofsociety and every region of China. Candidates were tested on their knowledge of theConfucian classics, writing set essays for each exam andmoving upward from countyto provincial to imperial level exams. Those who passed the exams were rewardedwith commensurate positions in the civil service. Scholars who failed in theexaminations or literati who needed extra income also provided a skilled labour forcethat in its own turn produced histories, guides, almanacs, medical texts and otherworks that were affordable and that could be aimed at broader markets than similarpublications in Europe. China's rivers, canals, and extensive internal trading networkdisseminated publications over a wide range and


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the shared Chinese characters made texts readable to those who spoke differentdialects or even different languages. Whether there was a ‘print revolution’ in Chinasimilar to Elizabeth Eisenstein's ‘print revolution’ in Europe is a matter of debate,as is the extent of literacy and the affordability and availability of printed books. Thefirst dated printed book in China is the Diamond Sutra of 868, but there is nothingthat seems to have the impact in China that Gutenberg did in the West. Manuscriptculture continued alongside print in China until very recent times, in part because ofthe scarcity or expense of texts and in part because of cultural preferences for copyingas a way of learning and for the appreciation of calligraphy as an art.Joseph P. McDermott argues that there was a point at which printed text eclipsed

manuscript, at least in terms of numbers if not status. He cites recent studies in Chinathat show that the majority of surviving texts in medicine and drama are in manuscriptrather than print. Other studies show that titles in history, philosophy, literature andthe Confucian classics become dominant in printed editions only after the middle ofthe sixteenth century.3 Studies of texts that survived in libraries do not, of course,account for all of the more popular or ephemeral material that may have been printed,but whatever the case, woodblock technology worked well for producing text inChinese characters, there was a commercial market, and the cheapness of woodblockprinting did mean that printed texts were far more widely available in China than inthe West.It seems incongruous that after several centuries of studying the book in China,

Cynthia Brokaw could in 2007 still say that ‘The study of the Chinese book is stillin its infancy’.4 I believe Brokaw says this because of the enormous area that mustbe covered: twelve centuries of printing, the physical scale of China itself, its ethnicdiversity, its encounters with other cultures, and in the difficulties of reconstructinga history when so few traces remain.Wars, fires, floods, and the humidity and insectsof south China have obliterated many more treasures, some of which we only knowabout because of citations from other ancient sources. Kai-wing Chow's Publishing,culture, and power in early modern China (2004) has hundreds of footnotes for eachchapter, each footnote referencing the fragments that he had to assemble to reconstructthe history of publishing in a rather recent era of Chinese history.5 Chow notes, asdo others, that commercial publishers were looked down upon in China. Trading forprofit was not seen an honourable activity, leaving little impetus for families to gloryin their success or maintain the records of their houses. However, families didmaintaingenealogies, local governments produced gazetteers, and libraries preserved textsand produced catalogues, so not all is lost to us, although what may remain is onlya citation or a name.

3 J.P. McDermott, A social history of the Chinese book. Books and literati culture in lateimperial China. Hong Kong 2006 [Later reprinted as: Shu ji de she hui shi. Zhonghua di guowan qi de shu ji yu shi ren wen hua. Beijing 2009].

4 C.J. Brokaw, ‘Book history in premodern China: the state of the discipline’, in: Book history10 (2007), 253-290, 279.

5 K. Chow, Publishing, culture, and power in early modern China. Stanford 2004.


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Current studies

The past ten years have seen several important studies published in the West and inChina that have expanded our knowledge and pointed to newmethods of investigation.Brokaw, cited above, provides a lengthier description of recent scholarship than thissurvey can attempt.6What follows will provide a few examples that show the generaldirection Chinese book history has been taking and some of the fields it could explorein the future.Lucille Chia's Printing for profit: the commercial publishers of Jianyang, Fujian

(11th-17th centuries), issued in 2002, indicates in its title some of the scale that mustbe dealt with in China.7 Her important work covers only one small region of Chinaand three families that maintained a printing and publishing tradition over 600 years.Chia's study is a social history that is made possible in part because the productivityof her printing families meant that many examples of their work have survived, eitherin physical format or in descriptive format in catalogues of no longer extantcollections. Chia also cautions that what has survived are mostly elite materials.Popular material, cheaply produced, found no elite private libraries to preserve it andfew scholars to write about it. How much was published and what impact it had onsociety may never be known, but she believes that the publishers she studied didhave a substantial popular market.Northern Fujian province is mountainous and isolated but rich in bamboo, thus

allowing for the development of an extensive paper industry. Cheap paper made ita good location for publishing and the Fujian publishers soon became known fordistributing cheap editions of everything from the Chinese classics to medical texts,popular collections of fiction and poetry, encyclopaedias, and school primersthroughout China. Chia made use of the actual texts, examining over two thousandimprints or their catalogue surrogates. Genealogies provided her with another source,used in conjunction with generational names that could tie a name in an imprint toa family in a genealogy or linking a genealogy name to printers or writers in a text,although it was still frustrating as the genealogies would refer only to a man'sscholarship or his community service or filial piety and never to his work as a printeror publisher. The genealogies did enable Chia to trace the kinship ties that boundthese families together in their business and they provided information on social andeconomic conditions. Likewise, local gazetteers did not provide direct informationon printing and publishing but did indicate the economic situation of the area, thenumber of schools and degree holders, but also showed some pride in the localpublishing industry and the attention it gained from merchants outside the region.Although the region was known for its printing and paper, both were considered bycontemporaries to be of low quality, with most government printers shunning thebamboo paper from the area as inferior for their enormous print projects. Withoutthe pressures of external government demand, the local printers relied on developingstrong family and commercial printing enterprises. The reputation for poor qualitydid not seem to affect the popular demand for Jianyang

6 Brokaw, ‘Book history in premodern China’.7 L. Chia, Printing for profit. The commercial publishers of Jianyang, Fujian (11th-17th

centuries). Cambridge, Mass., 2002.


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imprints. Whatever their quality, they had the advantage of being available andaffordable. Civil-service examination students, which could have been several hundredthousand by the thirteenth century, formed one of the largest markets and gave theJianyang publishers a national market. Students had to master the Confucian classics,the various commentaries on them, history, and poetry.

Figure 4. Examination halls in Guangdong province, 1873. Each candidate would write his examinationwithin the confines of the small cubicle assigned to him

Dictionaries, writing guides, and collections of successful examination essaysmight also be purchased to supplement the required texts. Medical texts, usuallycontaining prescriptions, were also popular with a lay audience as well as forprofessionals.What Chia was able to reconstruct depicts a vibrant publishing industrythat sought out and supplied a national readership across several markets, low tohigh. It accommodated itself to wars, natural disasters, dynastic changes, foreignoccupation, and changing literary tastes. Technological changes also occurred in themanner in which woodblocks were carved. A variety of styles was used in carvingtext, with value placed on flowing calligraphic styles that resembled manuscript. Bythe middle of the sixteenth century the Jianyang publishers were adopting a styleknown as the workman style: straight and thin lines that were easier to cut and thatallowed more characters to be put into each of the vertical columns of text. Lessskilled labour could thus produce more pages of text. The mechanical appearance ofthe texts did not make them popular with readers who appreciated the aesthetics ofthe older texts but did make more texts affordable


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to a growing market. Movable type was not unknown to the Jianyang publishers -Chia found about ten of the 1600 imprints she studied were printed with movabletype - but it usually required government sponsorship to meet its high costs.8

Christopher A. Reed'sGutenberg in Shanghai. Chinese print capitalism, 1876-1937(2004) covers the modern period and a time when there is more surviving data.9 Theselection and interpretation of that data still leaves room for debate, but scholarsstudying the book in China in the modern age have more evidence to work with.Western books and Western technology are also brought into the story, making thismore familiar territory for Western readers. In his opening Reed discusses printculture, print commerce, and print capitalism in the context of Chinese book history.Non-commercial publications - official and literati - were extensive but the overallmarket for books was large enough for commercial publishers to profit from it. Thesize of the literate population can only be roughly estimated. The female populationwas almost entirely illiterate but it is possible that as much as 45% of the malepopulation or from 20% to 25% of the entire population in the eighteenth centurywas literate. Between the high and low estimates there could have been a market of90 to 200 million people (out of a population of 450 million) in the late nineteenthcentury, a literate population that at the high end would have exceeded that of theliterate population of the English-speaking world. Towards the end of that centurymany new influences were changing the nature of Chinese publishing. The demandfor the Chinese classics was still strong but the examination system, still focused onConfucian classics, was under attack and finally abolished in 1904. Christianmissionaries from Europe and America began opening colleges and introducingWestern science, technology, literature and philosophy to China. Those colleges,secularised in the 1920s, laid the foundations for China's modern universities. Therewas now a demand for imported Western books and for translations of them intoChinese. Traditional xylography was unable to supply this large and multi-lingualmarket and its demand for modern graphics and photographic illustrations.Woodblockprinting was basically a cottage industry that could draw on family resources for thepurchase of blocks and family labour for carving, printing and distribution. Printingwith movable type, stereotype, or lithography required substantial capital andexpensive and highly skilled labour. The Protestant missionaries, who wanted toreach the millions of the Chinese population, found that woodblock printing was notadequate for printing tens or hundreds of thousands of Bibles or tracts. Themissionaries not only had religious zeal, they also had the capital to produce or importChinese type and to establish presses in China. By the end of the nineteenth century,China also had its own capital markets and a cadre of Chinese compositors andprinters, many trained at the mission press, began to operate their own presses. Thecentres of printing had shifted from southern China, first to Beijing and then toShanghai, where Western settlements had made it into a cosmopolitan city that hadan insatiable demand for books, and perhaps more importantly, for newspapers andmagazines. Shanghai was not far from Jianyang but it was not a rural province ofsmall villages but a city that grew from 230,000 in 1842, when

8 C.J. Brokaw,Commerce in culture. The Sibao book trade in the Qing and Republican periods.Cambridge, Mass., 2007.

9 C.A. Reed,Gutenberg in Shanghai. Chinese print capitalism, 1876-1937. Hong Kong 2004.


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the Treaty of Nanjing forced China to accept foreign settlements in its major ports,to a city of one million by the end of the century.The Chinese government was leery of Christianity and had banned it in 1724.

Until the Treaty, Christian missionaries worked secretly within China or workedmore freely outside of China, primarily in Malaysia and Macau. There were manyearly discussions within the missionary community of the advantages anddisadvantages and relative costs of xylography, lithography, and movable metal type.Walter Henry Medhurst (1796-1857) computed the costs of printing a two thousandcopy run of a Chinese Bible. He estimated that printing it using xylography wouldtake three years and cost £1,900 in labour and materials, lithography would take twoyears and cost £1,262 and metal type would take one year and cost £1,515. Despiteits higher cost, type was preferred because at the end of the print run the Chinesewoodblocks or stone lithography blocks would be worn out while the type could bereused or recast. With the greater freedom allowed to the missionaries after the Treatyof Nanjing, missionary presses expanded rapidly. In 1844, when the Treaty ofWangxia forced China to grant concessions to the Americans, the AmericanPresbyterian Mission Press (APMP) began work in Macau using Chinese workmenand a French type by Marcellin LeGrand that combined the 214 Chinese radicals,the roots of many characters, with another 1,100 characters, thereby allowing for theprinting of compound characters. Enlarged to 3,000 characters cut by Chinese studentsin France, the LeGrand font could produce almost 23,000 characters. The APMP soonmoved to Ningbo on the mainland and enlarged its activities, adding a type-castingfurnace in 1846. In 1858 William Gamble arrived at the APMP in Ningbo andrevolutionised the type process by creating new Chinese matrices by electrotypingand improved composition by designing a new and more efficient arrangement oftype cases. By 1876 the APMP hadmoved to Shanghai, employed up to eighty Chineseworkmen, andwas using and selling to others typefaces in Chinese, Japanese,Manchu,and English. In the 1890s the APMP hired three graduates of one of its mission schools,Xia Ruifang, and the brothers Bao Xian'en and BaXianchang. In 1897 these threewould leave APMP and found Commercial Press, one of the three presses that woulddominate Chinese publishing.The impact of foreignmissionaries on the development of the book in China cannot

be underestimated. The missionaries began distributing Chinese translations of theBible in the 1820s but it was the introduction ofWestern printing presses andWesternscience and concepts of government, spread through the journals published by themissionaries in Shanghai and Canton that would revolutionise China. The spread ofthe mission colleges provided opportunities for young and often poor Chinese boys,and even for Chinese girls, to get an education, learn new Western technologiesWestern medicine, and Western philosophies. Their teachers could also learn fromthe Chinese: one among them was James Legge, the Scottish missionary whotranslated the Chinese classics for the West. One of the students was Sun Yat-Sen(1866-1925), who would become the father of the new Chinese republic. Sun wasfinanced in part by Charlie Song, also educated by missionaries. Song made the starton his fortune by printing Bibles for the missionaries and used part of his fortune tosupport Sun Yat-Sen and his revolution.10

10 J.D. Spence, The search for modern China. New York 1991, 227.


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The nineteenth century was a period of turmoil and humiliation for China. The TaiPing uprising (1850-1864), instigated by a small Christian cult that grew rapidly insouthern China, seized Nanjing, threatened Beijing and the Empire, and cost tens ofmillions of lives in warfare and starvation. Defeated by England in the Opium War(1839-1842), China lost Hong Kong and was forced to open its ports to foreign tradeand settlement. An aggressive Japan seized Taiwan in 1894 and further pressure fromEngland, France, Germany, America, and Russia threatened China with division intoareas under foreign control. Chinese students began to travel to Japan to study thereasons behind the rise of Japanese power and to Europe and America to learn newtechnologies to modernise the Chinese military. Jonathan Spence, in his history ofmodern China, outlines the importance of translation in the building of a new China.Spence focuses on Europe as the source of much of this activity, but, as Westadnotes, Japan was also a key bridge between old and new.11 China's modernisationbegan in the 1860s as Chinese students began to return from study abroad. Amongthem was Yung Wing, the first Chinese to graduate with an American universitydegree, a BA from Yale in 1854.12 Yung was commissioned to obtain machine toolsfrom Europe and America, forming the basis of new arsenals in China. The arsenals,at Shanghai and Fuzhou, became technical schools and necessitated the translationof technical books for their students and faculty. In 1863 a translation of HenryWheaton's Elements of international law (1836) was translated into Chinese and wassuccessfully used by the Chinese in their dealings with Western diplomats. Threehundred copies of the translation were printed by the Imperial court and distributedto provincial officials. The Chinese government also began opening language schoolsand in 1867 were able to expand one of the schools into a college that taught scienceand International law.13Another translator was Yan Fu, who went to England in 1877to study naval technology at Portsmouth and Greenwich and who producedtranslations of Huxley,Mill, Montesquieu, and Adam Smith.14Marxism first appearedin print in China in 1899, but theCommunist manifestowas not published in a Chinesetranslation until 1906 and then only as a summary.15 Translations of Marx also camefrom Japan by 1910. The Chinese revolution of 1911 was driven in large part byprint, just as the ideology of the Communist Party and Mao Tse-Tung would use thedominance of their state-run presses to flood the nation with the Little Red Book.Developments in China since the 1980s have seen some many small independentpublishing houses develop, but there are still almost 600 state-owned publishinghouses and state control still remains. The literacy rate in China has risen to over92% and visitors to China are usually amazed by the numbers who throng to China'ssuper-sized book shops and book fairs. The annual book fair in Hong Kong, withpublishers from Hong Kong, Mainland China, and Taiwan, has been attracting over900,000 visitors annually for the past two years.

11 O.A. Westad, Restless empire. China and the world since 1750. London 2012.12 Spence, The search for modern China, 197.13 Ibidem, 200.14 Ibidem, 237.15 Ibidem, 256.


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Future directions

The history of the book in China presents scholars with opportunities to studycenturies of printing and publishing that was satisfied by a stable and appropriatetechnology followed by a period of revolution and change. Much remains to be donein studying the publishing and bookselling industries in the many regions of China,in the importation and translation of texts from outside of China, on the impact ofChinese texts on Southeast Asia, Japan, and Korea, and on the impact of texts fromthose countries on China. Many of the titles in English-language collections built upby nineteenth-century British residents in Shanghai and Hong Kong were publishedby Longman: a study of the export of texts from Longman and of scientific and otherworks from European publishers into China help us understand the transmission ofideas and technology from West to East. It would also help Western book historiansto see what impact trade to Asia had on their own publishing industries. Besidesstudies of the first translations of Western texts into Chinese, some valuable insightscould be gained by studying translations from Chinese into European languages. Ifthe history of the book in China is not in its infancy, as Brokaw said, it is certainlya broad and fertile field for scholarship that would reward both East and West in itsstudy.


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Christine Haug, Slávka Rude-Porubská &Wolfgang Schmitz‘Buchwissenschaft’ in GermanyAn Overview

The book as a reflection of social change since the Age of Antiquity and on throughthe Middle Ages to the 20th and 21st centuries has a long history, but it only becamethe object of research and teaching at universities at a relatively late date.Buchwissenschaft1 as an academic discipline in Germany is a relative new-comer tothe scene, and thus one would have to concede that it has a ‘short university history’.2

The current scholarly research in the field of Buchwissenschaft is marked by apronounced ‘scientific plurality of methodologies’, the origins of which can only besketched here briefly. As for example Christine Haug emphasizes, the short history,whether at the institution or university level, is tantamount up to the present day toa ‘remarkable deficit when it comes to a discussion of methods guided by theory’.3

In recent years there has been a more intense discussion both of teaching andresearch in the field of Buchwissenschaft as individual disciplines as well as of itsposition with regard to other fields of scholarly research. These discussions abouthowBuchwissenschaft apprehends itself and what its true agenda is have taken placeat numerous scholarly conferences4 and the proceedings have been widely publicized.5

At the same time, though, the process of creating a theoretical model forBuchwissenschaft

1 This article was translated byMurray G. Hall. Translator's note: There is no generally acceptedtranslation of the word Buchwissenschaft in English and for that reason I decided to use theoriginal German term here. Equivalents in the English-speaking world which would seemto come close to the German term are, for example, ‘history of the book’, ‘book history andprint culture’, or simply ‘print culture’. In addition, I also decided not to (attempt to) translatethe names of the many German institutions, departments, societies and the like - as this wouldonly confuse the reader.

2 U. Rautenberg, ‘Buchwissenschaft als Wissenschaft. Bestandsaufnahme und ErlangerPerspektiven’, in: D. Moser [et al.] (eds.), Neues vom Buch. Innsbruck 2011, 41-58, 45.

3 Ch. Haug, ‘Studiengänge Buchwissenschaft inMünchen’, in:Moser,Neues vom Buch, 62-69,63.

4 For example the conference ‘Buchwissenschaftliche Forschung: Bestandsaufnahme undPerspektiven’, staged in October 2006 by the Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis für Bibliotheks-,Buch- und Mediengeschichte, the conference ‘Konzepte buchwissenschaftlicher Forschungund Lehre’ held in May 2007 at the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg orelse the international conference ‘Neues vomBuch.Mediale und ökonomische Aspekte einerkünftigen Buchforschung’, which took place inNovember 2009 at theAlpen-Adria-Universitätin Klagenfurt, thus embracing Austrian research on the book.

5 U. Rautenberg (ed.), Buchwissenschaft in Deutschland. Ein Handbuch. 2 vols., Berlin/NewYork 2011; Moser, Neues vom Buch. These two works deal in detail with the early conceptsbehind and discussion of Buchwissenschaft in Germany (as well as in Austria and Switzerland)as an academic discipline and also offer a concise overview of what is currently being offeredin the field of scholarship and teaching.


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in Germany, one which would ensure the ‘subject a legitimate [and stable] place’ inthe contemporary family of sciences, has yet to be concluded. The discussion as tothe self-image of the field and the status of Buchwissenschaft as a subject? Adiscipline? An integrated science? An applied science?’6 is set to continue. Likewisea continuing discussion about the relationship between scientific and practice-orientedknowledge in the Buchwissenschaft curricula. In the university research landscapethis certainly has to be seen as a deficiency. However, we can concur with ErnstFischer that the fact that Buchwissenschaft has hitherto been unable to develop aclear identity - something which gives it, as an academic discipline, the character ofa ‘project in permanence’ - does have its positive sides.7 In Fischer's view, the worldof the book in the modern media world and environment has been transformed intoa ‘fascinating laboratory, [it has become] the venue for countless communicationsexperiments’,8 something which has repeatedly prompted Buchwissenschaft tore-define its focus of study and continues to do so. In unison with other specialistsin the field, Fischer has called for contemporary Buchwissenschaft to be regardedas an integrated science which he feels is able to master the central challenge in thisfield, namely to observe in real time the ‘forms of a far-reaching upheaval in humancommunications relationships and accompany them with a critical analysis’ and allthe while devoting its energy to ‘the examination of the historical dimension of thebook’ and ‘maintaining interest in the history of the book’.9

The (pre-academic) origins of Buchwissenschaft can be traced back to the 18thcentury. The two-volume work by Michael Denis, Einleitung in die Bücherkunde,published 1777/1778 and devoted to bibliography and literary history is an earlyexample of a key study in the German language. In its early days, dealing with booksfrom a scholarly point of viewwas verymuch focussed on themainly physical aspectsof the book and closely tied especially to fields of research related to the History ofthe Book such as Buchkunde, Buchwesen, bibliography, Library Science, writing thehistory of the book trade, study of the classics, editions as well as incunabula researchand printing research. Later the perspective shifted from the physical to the medialaspects of the book; currently the media specifics and the position of book in across-medial comparism are at the forefront of the research interest.A further characteristic of the early phases of scholarly book research is that it

joined the consensus in the book trade - which was also formulated around the endof the 18th century - that the book had a ‘special economic and legal status’.10

Accordingly, the book was seen both as a commercial object and as cultural property.In the course of the growing interest in contemporary legal, organizational, economicand technical aspects of book production and circulation, researchers reached out tothe book trade, its organ-

6 U. Saxer, ‘Buchwissenschaft als Medienwissenschaft’, in: Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft.Vol. 1, 65-104, 75.

7 E. Fischer, ‘Buchwissenschaft im 21. Jahrhundert. Probleme und Perspektiven’, in: Moser,Neues vom Buch, 26-38, 36.

8 Ibidem, 33.9 Ibidem, 37.10 Rautenberg, ‘Buchwissenschaft als Wissenschaft’, 46.


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izations and companies, such as publishing houses, bookstores or else wholesalers.Ursula Rautenberg sees the establishment of an extra-ordinary professorship at theHandelshochschule in Leipzig in 1925 for book trade management skills as beingpart of this development.11 Thomas Keiderling and Siegfried Lokatis emphasize thatthe new teaching post in Leipzig marked ‘a new focus or a change of focus in thefield of Buchwissenschaft, away from topics pertaining more or less to libraries orthe physical aspects of the book and in the direction of problems pertaining to theeconomics of the book, to the book market or business administration’.12 At present,the economic aspect of the book is also one of the key pillars of the Buchwissenschaftcurricula at the University of Leipzig, alongside the history of the book and theoryof the book. The unit there has existed since 1994/1995, at which time Dietrich Kerlenwas appointed professor, and is part of the communications and media studiesdepartment.Scholars of Buchwissenschaft in Leipzig see this inclusion of Buchwissenschaft

in media studies by all means as ‘a pilot project’,13 which attempts to do justice tothe fact that it has become increasingly difficult to draw a fine line - as was one timepossible - between the mass media and the individual media (such as a book). Themedia studies approach in Leipzig by no means precludes historical topics. Ofimportance is the research on publishing history, based on the company archives ofthe Leipzig-based firms such as Brockhaus or Reclam, as well as publishing historyof the Nazi period and the German Democratic Republic (GDR). The scholarlytraditions briefly described here also spawned the research programmes and coursestaught at a number of other Buchwissenschaft institutions in Mainz (1947/1997),Erlangen (1998), Munich (1987) or Münster (1999), which, while competing withone another in terms of research work and location, have sharpened their profiles byusing various theoretical and methodological approaches, be they cultural studies(Mainz), media studies (Erlangen) or the social history of literature (Munich). Inaddition, the current methodological repertoire of Buchwissenschaft is augmentedby various branches of research such as systems theory, semiotics, businessadministration as well as media and cultural sociology.Buchwissenschaft has gradually emancipated itself from the study of books

(Buchkunde), which tended to focus on objects. A parallel development at Germanuniversities saw the establishment of Buchwissenschaft as a subject in its own rightin the second half of the twentieth century and a trend toward the book as it existstoday and its trans-disciplinary opening. This process has manifested itself in thestrategies surrounding the naming of the institutions and hiring policy at the academiclocations where Buchwissenschaft is taught. The Johannes-Gutenberg-University atMainz, for example, which is the oldest university location in Germany whereBuchwissenschaft is taught, established a chair for the study of books, types andprinting in 1947, a post which was taken up by the acknowledgedGutenberg specialistAloys Ruppel. It was his field of specialization which left its mark on the originalresearch profile in Mainz. His

11 Ibidem.12 T. Keiderling, S. Lokatis, ‘Zur Geschichte, Ausprägung und Zukunft eines LeipzigerModells’,

in: Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 819-828, 820.13 Ibidem, 824.


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main interest was focussed on ‘the materiality of communication and incunabularesearch.’14 The current focus of research at the Institut für Buchwissenschaft inMainz (renamed in 1997), which is part of the faculty of Philosophy and Philologyand has four full professorships, two honorary professorships and a junior professorpost, is on media convergence, digitalization, reader research and popular bookcultures. Buchwissenschaft inMainz is mainly based on the historical cultural studies,which is inspired among other things by the French school of the Annales as well asCultural Studies from the Anglo-American scholarly community.15Buchwissenschaftand library and information studies has been a special focus of study at theFriedrich-Alexander-University Erlangen-Nürnberg since its inception in 1974. Aprofessorship was added in 1983 and the historian OttoMayer was appointed director.This provided the basis for Buchwissenschaft, which is part of the Department ofMedia Studies and Art History and acquired its current name in 1998. TheBuchwissenschaft programme in Erlangen defines ‘the historical dimensions of topicsrelated to Buchwissenschaft’ as ‘the most significant aspect of its profile in terms ofresearch and teaching.’16

The two full professorships and one honorary professorship devote their time andenergy to decidedly current fields such as media sociology, digitisation as well asmedia and publishing law. The junior professorship is devoted to the field of theeconomics of the book trade. Thus the approach in Erlangen (while the interest inresearch related to the history of the book remains strong) reflects the observationpostulated by Ursula Rautenberg, namely ‘the current trend in research and teachingtoward opening itself up to all facets of communication via the medium book anddeep-rooted changes in such media.’17 The changing of the name of the institutionin 1999 from Forschungsinstitut für Buchwissenschaft und Bibliographie (InstitutumErasmianum) - which, located at the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität in Münstersince the 1950s, mainly focussed on palaeography and the culture of mediaevalmanuscripts - to Institut für Buchwissenschaft und Textforschung - and it must benoted that the English literature scholar, book and library historian Bernhard Fabianin Münster was instrumental in the renaming - can be regarded as an example of theconsolidation and at the same time re-orientation of Buchwissenschaft as an academicdiscipline. The late Middle Ages and the Early Modern period continue to set thetime frame inMünster for questions relating to book censorship and the phenomenonof book donations. Research in the field of reader socialisation also encompasses thenineteenth century and the present.18

In addition to these university locations with their established, independent insti-

14 S. Füssel, ‘Mit Gutenberg in die digitale Zukunft. DasMainzer Institut für Buchwissenschaftzwischen historischer Kulturwissenschaft und Medienwissenschaft’, in: Rautenberg,Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 829-838, 833.

15 Ibidem.16 V. Titel, ‘Zwischen allen Stühlen? Das universitäre Fach Buchwissenschaft in Erlangen’,

in: Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 801-818, 810.17 Rautenberg, ‘Buchwissenschaft in Deutschland’, 48.18 Cf. G. Müller-Oberhäuser, ‘Buchwissenschaft in Münster’, in: D. Kerlen, I. Kirste (eds.),

Buchwissenschaft und Buchwirkungsforschung. VII. Leipziger Hochschultage für Medienund Kommunikation. Leipzig 2000, 57-66.


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tutes or departments for Buchwissenschaft, the subject is also taught in various waysin new Bachelor and Master programmes which were created through the Bolognaprocess. One of these is the MA-programme in Angewandte Literaturwissenschaft atthe Freie Universität Berlin which specialises in literary business and management.On top of that there are other learning institutions in Germany such as theFachhochschulen, for example the Hochschule der Medien (BA in Mediapublishing)or the Hochschule für Wirtschaft, Technik und Kultur in Leipzig (BA in Booktradeand Publishing Management and MA in Publishing and Media Trade Management)which combine research into the history of the book with occupational training. Theprogrammes at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig concentrate onbook design and typography.19

A relevant aspect of the research and study programmes in Germany in the fieldof academicBuchwissenschaft is the firm commitment to a practice-oriented approach,that is cooperation with the book trade and the literary market. This has especiallyhigh priority within the framework of the Buchwissenschaft curricula at the Institutfür Deutsche Philologie of the University of Munich. Credit for this has to be givento Herbert G. Göpfert who took on an honorary professorship of book and publishinghistory in Munich in 1964. Göpfert, himself an experienced publisher andlong-standing editor for the Langen-Müller-Verlag and the Hanser Verlag, made ‘theproductive integration of scholarly and practical orientation’ the ‘constitutive featureof Buchwissenschaft inMunich.’20 This principle has been followed up to the presentday and the wide variety of job-oriented courses offered is indicative of this. Theteaching profile is influenced by a trans-disciplinary understanding of the characterof the book and integrates various knowledge components from the fields of businessadministration, law, technology and history.21 Thus the Buchwissenschaft departmentco-operates with other departments at the university, as, for example, business andmedia administration and business information technology. The theoretical foundationof the Munich model of Buchwissenschaft is based mainly on the social history ofliterature, which is interested in the productive connections between literary andsocial history.Buchwissenschaft at the four universities mentioned is also supported by the many

special advisory boards, the societies of friends or associations of former teachingstaff. Represented in the Verein der Freunde der Buchwissenschaft in Mainz, theFreundeskreis der Erlanger Buchwissenschaft, the Verein der Freunde derMünchnerBuchwissenschaft - BuWi Phil. or else the Gesellschaft der Freunde und Fördererder Leipziger Buchwissenschaft are publishers, booksellers, media experts and peoplefrom the various trade organisations, among them many alumni. As a sort ofintersection

19 There are also many other special societies, research libraries and bookmuseums in Germanywhich make an indispensable contribution to research on the history oft he book. Informationabout most of the relevant institutions is available online through the platform LOTSEBuchwissenschaft: www.lotse.uni-muenster.de/buchwissenschaft.

20 Ch. Haug, F. Mayer, ‘Die Münchner Buchwissenschaft: Methoden-Modelle-Theorien’, in:Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 839-856, 847.

21 Cf. G. Jäger, ‘Buchwissenschaft - dasMünchnerModell’, in: Buchhandelsgeschichte. Beilagezum Börsenblatt für den Deutschen Buchhandel 3 (1997), B. 94-B. 96.


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point between theory and practice, these organisations also provide content input.The Verein der Freunde der Buchwissenschaft, for example, is also involved in theannual Mainz colloquium, at which - in January 2012 - eight representatives of the(illustrated) reference book publishing trade discussed the future of this segment ofthe bookmarket. At the colloquium in January 2013 experts have gathered to discussthe topic of sustainable publishing. TheMunich alumni association BuWi Phil. invitedscholars in May 2012 to the traditional Network Day, which featured a paneldiscussion on the opportunities and challenges of the business with e-books. InErlangen, the society of friends there handles the organisation of the so-calledStudientag der Erlanger Buchwissenschaft, at which - for example in May, 2010 -the students, together with trade people, held numerous workshops to discuss theattractiveness of the book trade from the standpoint of the employer.Another mode of cooperation between the individual Buchwissenschaft institutes

on the one hand and businesses and organisations from the book trade on the otheris the awarding of prizes and/or stipends for student research projects and theses. InMunich, there is the annual Hugendubel-Preis given for the best final thesis. It isworth 5,000 euros and donated by the renowned Munich-based bookstore of thesame name. The Buchwissenschaft department in Leipzig regularly awards theFörderpreis der Medienstiftung der Sparkasse Leipzig, with prize money totalling2,500 Euros. The prize can also go to students other than those studying in Leipzig.In Mainz, students who base their final theses on the holdings in the Verlagsarchivin Mainz, the publishing company archives, as for example the EuropäischeVerlagsanstalt, the Rotbuchverlag and the Syndikat-Verlag or else parts of the archiveof Rowohlt Verlag which were donated to the Johannes-Gutenberg-University canreceive a grant from the publisher couple Sabine and Kurt Groenewold. TheBuchwissenschaft programme in Erlangen awards, together with the book concernThalia, scholarships to doctoral students dealing in their theses with topics such asmarket structure, business strategy and consumer behaviour in the book trade. InErlangen, top-notch graduate theses are awarded a Buwine-Preis (no prize money).Student research is also given recognition in another way. Students have theopportunity to publish their work in the online book series Alles Buch. Studien derErlanger Buchwissenschaft.22Research and teaching in the field of Buchwissenschaft at the university level is

also dependent on external funding and project grants. With the financial assistanceof research associations as well as from public and private foundations, it is especiallypossible to carry out long-term research projects and financially support the variousspecialised fields of scholarly endeavour. Such funding is also necessary to stageconferences, symposia or gatherings of specialists. In Munich, for example, they arein the throes of establishing a special focus on children's literature from the perspectiveof Buchwissenschaft. The undertaking has received the support of the privateWaldemar Bonsels-Foundation. The paradigm change in this segment of the bookmarket is continuously tracked through workingmeetings among scholars and lectureseries. In this process, the border between literature for young people and that for ageneral audience

22 www.alles-buch.uni-erlangen.de.


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is dissolved both thematically and formally and at the same time the internet isincreasingly marginalising the classic stages of book distribution.23

Figure 1. A volume from the Alles Buchseries: Rühr, Sandra (ed.), Verliert das Hörbuch seinenKörper? Die Auswirkungen des Downloads auf Bibliotheken, Buchbranche und Nutzer (2010)

The focus of the research project Abenteuer Buch. Konzepte und Strategien derLeseförderung bei Kindern und Jugendlichen which was established in 2006 by theBuchwissenschaft department in Erlangen as part of its media socialisation profileis on a discussion of the various approaches to reading socialisation. The aim is, incooperation with various partners in the teaching field, to come up with strategiesfor the promotion of reading and speaking skills at the kindergarten and primaryschool level. Those promoting this project include, among others, the PwC-StiftungJugendKultur-Bildung and the Jugendamt Erlangen. Thanks to the support of theDeutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, The German Research Council) theBuchwissenschaft department at Erlangen is involved in the development of thecentral Wissenschafts-

23 Things got underwaywith the lecture series ‘Quo vadis, Kinderbuch? Gegenwart und Zukunftder Literatur für junge Leser’ in the winter semester 2009/2010 and the subsequent annualmeeting (under the same theme) of the Internationale Buchwissenschajtliche Gesellschaft(IBG) in Leipzig. These papers have since appeared in print in: Ch. Haug, A. Vogel (eds.),Quo vadis, Kinderbuch? Gegenwart und Zukunft der Literatur für junge Leser. Wiesbaden2011. This lecture series was followed in the winter semester 2012/2013 by a second seriesentitled ‘Endlich erwachsen? Jugendliteratur im epochalen Wandel’. The lectures were heldat the University of Munich and in the Hugendubel-Bookstore.


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portal für die Bibliotheks-, Buch- und Informationswissenschaften b2i,24 an onlineresource for information in the library, book and information studies.The Buchwissenschaft programme in Leipzig has received funding from the

Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaft for the publishing history research projectLeipziger Verlagsarchive als Erinnerungsspeicher und Labor. Das Reclam-Archiv.The participation of the Institut für Buchwissenschaft inMainz in the interdisciplinaryresearch project Media Convergence was made possible through the support of theJohannes-Gutenberg-University. The latter helps fund scholarly gatherings, as forexample the international conference on semantics and the media in July 2011, andsubsidises the publication of specialised works such as the book seriesMedienkonvergenz, which has been published by De Gruyter since 2012 and whichattempts to analyse the effects of digitisation on the media, on forms ofcommunications, on media markets and media usage.

Department of Buchwissenschaft in Munich and St. Galler Zentrum fürdas Buch - a productive liaison

The Buchwissenschaft department inMunich maintains very close ties to the Institutefor Media and CommunicationsManagement (MCM)25 at the University of St. Gallenand there is a regular exchange of information between the two institutions. Thecooperation with the University and the St. Galler Zentrum für das Buch, which issituated in the Kantonsbibliothek Vadiana, has to be seen in light of the fact that theDeutsches Bucharchiv, which was founded by Ludwig Delp, moved from Munichto new quarters in St. Gallen in 2006. The re-organisation and re-orientation of theformer Deutsche Buchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft (DBG) resulted from thiscooperation. The new institution was renamed Buchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaftin 2007 and then in 2008 the name was changed to InternationaleBuchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft (IBG) in order to take into account the closecooperation with the St. Galler Zentrum für das Buch. The main interests of the IBGinclude aspects of the contemporary book market, as for example the impact ofdigitisation on the book business (consequences of the transformation of the mediaand for copyright to mention only two prominent topics).What distinguishes the IBG from the other scholarly organisationsmentioned earlier

is that it makes a special effort to involve and engage trade professionals such asbooksellers, publishers, book illustrators and printing experts. The IBG sees as oneof its main tasks to position the book as a medium in the media system itself, to graspand do research into the book in the context of the entire culture of the media.26

Christine Haug and Vincent Kaufmann have edited the journal Kodex. Jahrbuch derInternationalen Buchwissenschaftlichen Gesellschaft since 2011.

24 www.b2i.de.25 It was established in January 1998 with the support of the Bertelsmann Foundation and the

HeinzNixdorf Foundation and focuses on the research in the fields of KnowledgeManagementandMedia, Computational Media, Electronic Commerce and Corporate Communications aswell as Social Media and Mobile Communication.

26 W. Schmitz, ‘Die Internationale Buchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft’, in: Rautenberg,Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 1, 793-799, 795.


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Figure 2. Cover ofKodex. Jahrbuch der Internationalen BuchwissenschaftlichenGesellschaft 1 (2011)

Society members receive a complimentary copy of the annual publication, and inthe short period of its existence the journal has already made a name for itself in theinternational community. The IBG thus focuses on the period after 1945 and up tothe present day. Thus it only sees itself to a limited extent as a special society for thehistory of the book and publishing trade. There is common ground, however, whenit comes to the transformation processes in the book market in the twentieth andtwenty-first centuries (in this case at the international level).

Cooperation between non-institutionalised organisations and theDepartment of Buchwissenschaft in Munich at the trans-national level

As a relatively small department (in comparison with other centres forBuchwissenschaft in Germany), the department in Munich is equally eager tocooperate with organisationswhich have no institutional base.Munich and theAppliedGerman Studies section at the University of Klagenfurt are partners in the Erasmusstudent


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exchange programme and students from Munich are guests once a year at the Tageder deutschsprachigen Literatur. The cordial hospitality, the pleasant atmosphereand the unpretentious manner with which writers, publishers, jury members andliterary agencies socialise with the students make it easy for the latter to strike up aconversation with representatives of the German-language book trade. Because - aswas mentioned earlier - Buchwissenschaft is not an established field of study in thecurricula at universities in Austria, the department in Munich maintains close ties toindividual scholars - and here special mention should be made of Prof. Dr. MurrayG. Hall who teaches at the German Department of the University of Vienna - andinstitutions such as the Wienbibliothek im Rathaus. Common membership in theindividual associations, as for example the Gesellschaft für Buchforschung inÖsterreich, also serves to promote communication among like-minded scholars. TheBuchwissenschaft Department in Munich is also planning to co-host seminars in theBuchstadt Horn in the Austrian province of Lower Austria, more specifically in theCentre for Book Restoration, which is run by Dr. Patricia Engel und Prof. Dr. ToniKurz.Situated close together in the centre of the city there is the Kunsthaus, the Berger

printing press museum, the museums of the City of Horn and the Horn Castle, notto mention the countless libraries, lending libraries and book stores in Horn. In theimmediate vicinity there are archives and libraries in Altenburg, Rosenburg andGreillenstein. The Waldviertel region of Lower Austria can rightfully claim to be amajor centre for the art of the book and book design. The workshops in Horn comprisea studio for the restoration of books and paper. The studio is renowned for thepreservation and restoration of books, prints and other historical originals made outof paper, parchment and leather.Worth mentioning in this connection is the publishingfirm Galerie Thurnhof, which was founded in 1975 by the designer, publisher andprinter Toni Kurz, who organises book fairs, book exhibitions and literary eventsboth at home and abroad.One of the main aims of the Buchwissenschaft curriculum in Munich is, on the

one hand, to promote a close scholarly exchange with the institutions (some of whichnot are university-based) and on the other to foster wide-reaching cooperation withfellow specialists in Switzerland, Austria and England. The idea is to expand one'sown competence and horizon by working together to be able to offer students ofBuchwissenschaft in Munich the best possible scientific and practical training. Oneexample of this is the gradual expansion of the children's literature segment incooperationwith children's book publishers, with the Institut für Jugendbuchforschungin Frankfurt am Main and the working group Arbeitsstelle für Kinder- undJugendmedienforschung (ALEKI) in Cologne.Munich is thus an ideal media location and the close links between scholarship

and practical training in the courses offered, job training for BA-students whichprecedes study and the conscious effort to keep the Buchwissenschaft programmesmall and manageable have all contributed to a successful model which is nowattracting students to Munich from all over Germany as well as from Austria. Aresponsible education policy - i.e. not allowing the programmes to be overrun - is aguarantee that Munich will continue to offer students the best possible chance to finda job right after they graduate.


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Forums for scholarly communication: Publishing companies with aBuchwissenschaft programme

Two publishing companies are important for Buchwissenschaft research - theHarrassowitz Verlag in Wiesbaden and De Gruyter, which has offices in Munichand Berlin. The Buchwissenschaft focus in the Harrassowitz programme comprisesa wide range of series devoted to the History of Publishing and Library Science.Another important focus is the publication of the catalogues and book series ofindividual reference libraries. TheWolfenbütteler Notizen zur Buchgeschichte (since1976), theWolfenbütteler Schriften zur Geschichte des Buchwesens (likewise since1976) - which were conceived in cooperation with the Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreisfür Bibliotheks-, Buch- und Mediengeschichte and are published by the HerzogAugust Bibliothek Wolfenbüttel - or the Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte(since 1991), the official publication of the Leipziger Arbeitskreis zur Geschichtedes Buchwesens, are all devoted to research in the field of the history of the book.Kodex, the yearbook of the IBG is published annually from 2011 on and concentratesmainly on the current structural changes in the book and media industry.DeGruyter's Library& Information Science/Buchwissenschaft programme contains

sub-sections such as Books and Publishing, Libraries, Information andDocumentationas well as Press and Media. De Gruyter also publishes relevant reference books,bibliographies and lexicons. A current major project underway at De Gruyter is themulti-volume History of the German Book Trade in the 19th and 20th Century.27The Bramann Verlag in Frankfurt focuses on text books for print culture historians

with works related to their studies and training. Publications worth mentioning hereare the series Edition Buchhandel and the series CAMPUSBasics - buch & medien,which was initiated in 2012.Scholarly research and teaching, communication among peers in the field and

scholarly publishing are backed up by various working groups whose main aim it isto expand the network linking the individual locations for Buchwissenschaft and theresearch centres. These groups also seek to offer young scholars the opportunity toestablish themselves in the peer group community and take an active part in innovativeresearch discourses.

27 Reference here is to the successor to the comprehensive history of the book trade written byFriedrich Kapp and Johannes Goldfriedrich (around 1900), Geschichte des deutschenBuchhandels im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. The current project was commissioned by theHistorischeKommission des Börsenvereins des Deutschen Buchhandels. Thus far the volumesKaiserreich (1870-1918) have appeared in three parts, edited by Georg Jäger (and others)as well asWeimarer Republik (1918-1933) in two parts, edited by Ernst Fischer and StephanFüssel; theHistory of the Third Reich, which is scheduled to appear in two parts and is editedby Ernst Fischer and Reinhard Wittmann, is currently in progress.


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Figure 3. Cover of the Geschichte des deutschen Buchhandels im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert. Bd. 1:Das Kaiserreich 1870-1918. Tl. 2. Frankfurt am Main 2003

Scholarly working groups, their networks and publications

TheWolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis für Geschichte des Buchwesens was founded on 27May, 1975. The initiator was Herbert G. Göpfert who formulated the aims of theArbeitskreis as follows: ‘Many questions pertaining to the history of book printingand the book trade, the publishing business and the library, that is: questionsemanating from the communications field linking the author and the reader, have tobe examined and answered today with a view to new methodological aspects.’28

Members of the board during the founding phase were the literary historians andscholars of Buchwissenschaft Otto Dann, Bernhard Fabian, Herbert G. Göpfert,Rainer Gruenter, Bertold Hack, Hans A. Halbey, Ernst L. Hauswedell, Paul Raabeand Bernhard Zeller.29 The board was also concerned with appointing foreign scholarsto posts at German research centres. In order to relieve the board from day-to-daybusiness, it was decided to delegate this activity to a working committee made up ofPaul Raabe, Monika

28 H.G. Göpfert on 9 July, 1975; P. Vodosek, ‘DerWolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis für Bibliotheks-,Buch- und Mediengeschichte’, in: Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 1, 775-792, 777.

29 Ibidem, 778.


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Estermann, Erdmann Weyrauch and Herbert G. Göpfert. The focus of work andinterest was on research and the presentation of the latest research findings, in otherwords the aim was to stimulate innovative research.30

Once a year, the Arbeitskreis holds working meetings on topics which, at thattime, had long been neglected and which had scarcely been given in-depth attention.These topics included the book trade in the eighteenth century as well as the bookand book design in the Weimar Republic. The meetings were intended to encouragediscussion by including young scholars.31 The first such meeting in 1976, promptedby Herbert G. Göpfert, was devoted to the topic Buch und Leser32 (The Book andthe Reader).Although close cooperation between the two working groups - on the one hand

for the history of the book, on the other hand for library history - was desirable fromthe very beginning, the Herzog August BibliothekWolfenbüttel proposed in the year1998 that the two groups merge. One reason was the common interests, the other theorganisation and financing of the meetings. In September 1998, the Arbeitskreis fürBibliotheks-, Buch- und Mediengeschichte began its work. In the years since itsinception, the Arbeitskreis has succeeded in raising innovative questions, promotingdiscourse and re-visiting historical issues.33 One important aspect was and still is aninterdisciplinary and international approach. Among the topics the Arbeitskreis inWolfenbüttel has dealt with in recent times are libraries in the Age of Antiquity(2007), the clandestine book trade in the eighteenth century (2010) and more recentlythe school text book market around 1800. Since the merger of the two workinggroups, the scope has been expanded to include research on libraries, among otherthings during the Nazi period. This was, by the way, the subject of a conference heldin 2009 by the Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis in cooperation with the Herzogin AnnaAmalia Bibliothek.34 This topic has come in for considerable interest in the scholarlycommunity and will be covered again at a future conference focusing on publiclending libraries during the Nazi period. In addition to the above-mentioned bookseriesWolfenbütteler Schriften zur Geschichte des Buchwesens, which, as a rule,includes the contributions to the individual annual conferences, there is also thesemi-annual publication calledWolfenbütteler Notizen, edited by Thomas Stäckerand Andrea Opitz.The Leipziger Arbeitskreis zur Geschichte des Buchwesens for its part was founded

in 1990 at the initiative of the historian of the publishing trade (today he runs apublishing firm in Leipzig) Privatdozent Dr. Mark Lehmstedt in conjunction withthe Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Leipzig (formerly Deutsche Bücherei Leipzig). Itsaim is,

30 Ibidem.31 The board is currently made up of the following persons: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schmitz

(University Library Cologne), Dr. Thomas Stäcker (HABWolfenbüttel), Prof. Dr. ReinhartSiegert (University of Freiburg), Prof. Dr. Ursula Rautenberg (University of Erlangen), Prof.Dr. Christine Haug (University of Munich), Dr. Monika Estermann and (since 2012) Prof.Dr. Andrea Seidler (University of Vienna) and Dr. Sven Kuttner (University LibraryMunich).

32 H.G. Göpfert (ed.), Buch und Leser. Vorträge des ersten Jahrestreffens des WolfenbüttelerArbeitskreises für Geschichte des Buchwesens 13. und 14. Mai 1976. Stuttgart 1977.

33 Cf. Vodosek, ‘Der Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis’, 782-783.34 M. Knoche, W. Schmitz (eds.),Wissenschaftliche Bibliothekare im Nationalsozialismus.

Handlungsspielräume, Kontinuitäten, Deutungsmuster. Wiesbaden 2011.


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following German reunification, to give the very active book and publishing researchcommunity in the former GDR a publication and communication forum on a par withthose in theWest. The Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte is published on behalfof the Leipziger Arbeitskreis. The first editors were Mark Lehmstedt and LotharPoethe. Since 2011, the publication is edited by Thomas Fuchs, Detlev Döring andChristine Haug. In the meantime, the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Leipzig is nolonger a contract partner, and the Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte is nowaffiliated with the Leipzig University Library. The series Schriftenreihe des LeipzigerArbeitskreises zur Geschichte des Buchwesens is published parallel to the LeipzigerJahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte. It contains monographs, collected contributions andconference proceedings. One of the first volumes was devoted to inner-Germanliterary relations, based on the proceedings of a sensational conference entitled ‘DasLoch in der Mauer’ and held at the Haus des Buches in Leipzig.35

The many and varied special associations and societies - and in addition to theWolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis and the Leipziger Arbeitskreis we could also mentionthe Gutenberg-Gesellschaft or else the Gesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich(Society for Book Research in Austria) - focus their research on various topics andperiods. After all, the main interest is in offering as wide a spectrum as possible ofresearch into the history of the book, of no matter what period. This is not to fostercompetition in the search for research topics or to publish findings or recruit members.On the contrary, the lists of members of the various associations reveal that there arequite a few double and triple memberships.

Establishment of a network for a young generation of students ofBuchwissenschaft and publishing people - ibg Young Scholars as a newscholar network of the Internationale BuchwissenschaftlicheGesellschaft

What is special about the various institutions in the German-speaking countriesoffering studies in Buchwissenschaft is the fact that - whereas there is only a relativelysmall number of university locations - they are incredibly active, work closely withthe publishing trade and train junior scholars for the book trade as well as academiccareers. What has hitherto been lacking is the networking of young scholars andyoung people working in the book business. It must be said that countless juniorscholars receive their qualifications through courses of study in other faculties, asfor example Business Administration, Business Information Science or else Marketand Advertising Psychology, to name but a few. In Austria and Switzerland - whereBuchwissenschaft

35 M. Lehmstedt, S. Lokatis (eds.), Das Loch in der Mauer. Der innerdeutscheLiteraturaustausch. Wiesbaden 1997; M. Westendickberg, Die Diktatur des anständigenBuches. Das Zensursystem der DDR für belletristische Prosaliteratur in den sechziger Jahren.Wiesbaden 2004; Ch. Haug, Reisen und Lesen im Zeitalter der Industrialisierung. DieGeschichte des Bahnhofs- und Verkehrsbuchhandels in Deutschland von seinen Anfängenum 1850 bis zum Ende der Weimarer Republik. Wiesbaden 2007; J. Hahn (ed.), ‘Ich möchtedas Meine unter Dach und Fach bringen...’ Ernst Blochs Geschäftskorrespondenz mit demAufbau-Verlag Berlin 1946-1961. Eine Dokumentation. Wiesbaden 2006.


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per se is not part of any university curriculum - many young scholars carry outresearch within the framework of externally funded projects and are outside thescholarly communication loop. One of the main goals of the IBG has been to bringtogether young scholars and young employees in publishing companies at theinternational level and to create a junior scholar network with communicationsstructures organised by the participants themselves. For exactly that reason, a YoungScholars Forum was established within the IBG in 2011 which offers young studentsa network and an exchange forum reaching beyond an individual university or oneparticular field of study and provides them with the opportunity to discuss their ownprojects with others.36 The forum was launched in April 2011 at the Department ofBuchwissenschaft in Munich. During the two-day meeting, some 30 participants satdown to report on their individual research topics and their further planned activityand project ideas. In addition, the organisers invited experts from abroad to take partin in-depth discussions of methodological questions with the young scholars. Amongthose attending the first forumwere Dr. Bill Bell, director of the Centre for the Historyof the Book at the University of Edinburgh, the Bourdieu specialist Prof. Dr. JosephJurt (Freiburg) as well as Prof. Dr. Georg Jäger, the book historian in Munich. Asubstantial grant from a special junior scholar promotion programme at the Universityof Munich made it possible to stage the working meeting. The IBG Young ScholarsForum has been meeting every year since 2011. The two-day gatherings consist ofsmaller workshops and discussions. Students present their research projects and finaltheses, and external speakers are also invited. In 2012, the IBGYoung Scholar Forumwas held in Klagenfurt at the invitation of the Applied German Studies section ofthe German Department. The hosts were Mag. Constanze Drumm, Dr. Doris Moserand Dr. Arno Rußegger. Prof. Dr. Murray G. Hall from the University of Vienna andProf. Dr. Stefan Neuhaus from the University of Innsbruck were the guest speakers.After the forum, the hosts invited all the participants to take part in the literaturefestival known as the Tage der deutschsprachigen Literatur. In 2013, the IBG YoungScholars Forum will take place at the Institut für Buchwissenschaft in Erlangen.

Research on the history of the book done by research librarians inGermany

The relationship between the book and the librarian has undergone major changesover the course of time.37 The librarian of the late nineteenth century was seen as alearned authority on the book, nowadays not many would likely see themselves assuch. That in turn would seem to mirror the change which has taken place amonglibrarians.In the eighteenth century a good deal of thought was given to the profession of

the librarian. The view taken by the university librarian Johann Matthias Gesner in

36 The IBG Young Scholars Forum is open to both young scholars and to young people in thepublishing industry.

37 This section is based on W. Schmitz, ‘Buchwissenschaftliche Themen im Rahmen derAusbildung der wissenschaftlichen Bibliothekare in Deutschland’, in: Rautenberg,Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 891-912.


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Göttingen is famous.38 According to Gesner, in order to compile a good catalogue,the librarian needed - in the case of manuscripts - special knowledge of the subject,in the case of prints a knowledge of the history of printing and so on. After all, thatwas the time when intensive efforts were being made to examine incunabula. Duringthe period of secularisation the picture changed. The ideal was no longer the experton the history of knowledge, but instead the librarian who could fall back on acomprehensive education, had practical training on the job and was familiar with theins and outs of running a library and knew about the working processes. The sameapplies to Martin Schrettinger's Handbuch der Bibliothek-Wissenschaft39 publishedin 1807, and Friedrich Adolf Ebert's Die Bildung des Bibliothekars,40 as diverse asthe individual emphases may be.41

Knowledge of the history of the book is necessary as is that of the history oflibraries in order to define the history of the library. To what extent knowledge ofthe history of the book was, in Ebert's view, one of the tools of the trade for a librarianis evidenced by the fact that he described his work on palaeography as the secondvolume of his Die Bildung des Bibliothekars. He also collected material for a majorhistory of the art of book printing, for which his article about the Coster-Gutenbergquestion (1823) was a precursor.The dispute over what constitutes ‘true’ library science has accompanied the

development of the image of the modern librarian until the present day. The variousbook history and library history disciplines have come to be recognised as of theessence within the field of Buchwissenschaft.It was in these two disciplines that the libraries in the nineteenth century (e.g. the

contribution made by Andreas Schmeller at the Court Library in Munich) andespecially at the end of the century could point to a wealth of significant results. Oneonly need recall the progress made in the field of incunabula research, such as theestablishment of Haebler's Method which involved compiling a list of types used byeach printer and making it easier to distinguish one from another with considerableaccuracy. But this development is also characterised by research into print historywith an eye to individual locations, the book trade and the compilation of notedcatalogues of manuscripts (as e.g. the excellent manuscript catalogues compiled forthe Royal Library in Berlin by Valentine Rose) and the index of old prints (see forexample the complete catalogue of incunabula).Thus we stumble upon an odd discrepancy, namely that the daily chores of the

libraries were determined even back then by the library administration, and the image

38 J. Franke, ‘Ein Gutachten Johann Matthias Gesners über die Anforderungen desbibliothekarischen Berufs’, in: Sammlung bibliothekswissenschaftlicher Arbeiten 8 (1895),98-104.

39 M. Schrettinger, Handbuch der Bibliotheks-Wissenschaft (new printing of the Vienna 1834edition). Ed. by H. Nitzschner [et al.]. Hildesheim 2003. In this work he expresses theconviction, ‘that not every literary-minded person is suitable for a position as a librarian;moreover, even themost learned scholar, indeed even a true polymath, would have to embarkon a special course of study and gain practical experience in a both lengthy and necessaryprocess...’ (150). He also cites the book by F.A. Ebert mentioned here.

40 F.A. Ebert, Die Bildung des Bibliothekars. Facsimile edition of the 2nd revised printing in1820. Leipzig 1958.

41 F. Nestler, Friedrich Adolf Ebert und seine Stellung im nationalen Erbe derBibliothekswissenschaft. Leipzig 1969.


the librarians had of themselves as library scientists was defined in the main by thehis-


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torical disciplines. This ambivalence became even more entrenched because thescholarliness of their profession - in light of the growing number of administrativetasks which the overwhelmingmajority of librarians were faced with - was of utmostimportance to them. In the end no really satisfying solution was found to thetheoretical question as to whether the various practice-oriented disciplines of libraryscience should be combined with the historical-philological subjects to come up witha uniform library science.42Until, that is, a novel definition of the term library scienceemerged under foreign influence. The consequences for people dealing with bookswere clear, no matter whether new approaches from the communications scienceswere brought into play (Klutz) or else the new focus of interest was on librarymanagement. In 1970 a highly-touted colloquium on library science was held inCologne. As it turns out, it pushed the historical-philological school of thought whichhad dominated scholarly interest up until then to the periphery:

Naturally, research into the history of libraries will remain a legitimatetask in future as well. Research into the history of the book is linked tothat task in a natural way. The methods which are applied here come fromthe fields of historical, art-historical and philological studies. However,the history of the book and the history of libraries which, in earlier days,usually stood alone as the epitome of scholarliness will in future no longerbe the focal point of library science.43

Paul Aegean's approach to library science as a special form of information sciencewhich he used as the basis for the curriculum of his chair in Cologne did, of course,include the historical disciplines and the various forms of publication past andpresent.44

The search went out for a new approach to scholarliness which no longerconcentrated on the book and its history, but instead on making day-to-day librarypractice into a kind of science in its own right. The new ideal was the referencelibrary.45 This principle gradually found its way into the curriculum of library trainingschools such as the Bibliothekar-Lehrinstitut (BLI) in Cologne and the institutes inMunich and Frankfurt and for a while in Hamburg.A wealth of different historically oriented questions about the book and the library

were posed for a long time to come at the final written exams in the tradition of the

42 G. Leyh, Die Bildung des Bibliothekars. Kopenhagen 1952: ‘Because library science islacking in its entirety a crystalized core from which it can unfold. In fact library science is,as becomes very clear in the “Handbuch”, a juxtaposition of individual disciplines which arerelated to one another not in terms of contents, but instead linked together more by chancethrough an external shell, the corpus of the book. Of course, this has to be undertaken byexperts; otherwise, there would be a culture gap without their work, and this would have tobe considered unworthy.’ (89-90).

43 W. Grunwald, W. Krieg, ‘Die Bibliothekswissenschaft in Forschung und Lehre’, in:W. Krieg (ed.), Bibliothekswissenschaft. Versuche einer BegriffsbestimmungBegriffsbestimmung in Referaten undDiskussionen bei demKölner Kolloquium (27.-29.Oktober 1969). Köln 1970, 155-162; Bibliotheksdienst 1970, 175-180.

44 See also P. Kaegbein (ed.), Bibliothekswissenschaft als spezielle Informationswissenschaft.Frankfurt am Main 1986.

45 Cf. The deliberations regarding the reform of library training for senior library staff (1973).


Berlin training programme at the BLI in Cologne and its successors (works from theBLI


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Cologne).46 The historically-oriented questions, including those having to do withthe printed book, came - in light of the demands posed by library practice - intoincreasingly close touch with the theoretical superstructure of library science. If andwhen the book as a physical object evokes the special interest of the librarian, thenit is especially from the point of view of management - as for instance when someoneis confronted with the urgent problem of preserving holdings as part of an allianceto preserve printed books.47

Nevertheless, research on the history of the book is still carried out today - mainlyin the rare book departments of the major libraries. We can only mention a few ofthe projects here: themain focus is on cataloguing. One is themulti-volumeHandbuchder historischen Buchbestände, which is published by the Olms Verlag and to whichno small number of libraries contributed. It lists the holdings in publicly accessiblecollections which appeared prior to the year 1900 and classifies them according tosubject. The comprehensive indices make it easy to find the information beingsought.48 Whereas in this case we are looking at entire subjects, traditionally thecataloguing work at libraries focuses on individual titles. Accordingly, theStaatsbibliothek Berlin has had its own comprehensive catalogue of incunabula since1904. It is a complete index spanning libraries around the globe, is a ‘work inprogress’, and in the meantime the whole index is online.49 The indices ofsixteenth-century prints (VD 16), seventeenth-century prints (VD 17) andeighteenth-century prints (VD 18) are of special interest to researchers in theGerman-speaking countries. The project is a cooperative venture among librariesand is supported by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).Cataloguing of individual collections (manuscripts, incunabula, prints) continues

at individual libraries. One example is the catalogue of incunabula at the BayerischeStaatsbibliothek,50 which has the world's largest such collection. Such indices ofindividual works in the above-mentioned comprehensive catalogues make note ofvariations from the original, that is provenances, hand-written notations and additions,bindings etc.Increasing attention has been devoted in recent years in particular to provenance

research. The aim is to trace the ownership of manuscripts and prints and, if possible,to identify these persons and thus deal with questions pertaining to book ownership,reception and the reconstruction of old libraries.51 Useful in this connection are thetraces of reader usage.52

46 I. Konze, Verzeichnis der Kölner Hausarbeiten für die Laufbahnprüfung des höherenBibliotheksdienstes am Bibliothekar-Lehrinstitut des Landes NRW/Fachhochschule fürBibliotheks- und Dokumentationswesen in Köln 1949-1986. Köln 1988.

47 www.allianz-kulturgut.de.48 fabian.sub.uni-goettingen.de.49 www.gesamtkatalogderwiegendrucke.de.50 Inkunabelkatalog der Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek. Vol. 1-7, Wiesbaden 1988-2009, in

digital form as BSB-Ink.51 Cf. the Provenance portal of the HAABWeimar:

www.klassik-stiftung.de/einrichtungen/herzogin-anna-amalia-bibliothek/projekte/provenienzportal.html.52 H.P. Neuheuser (ed.),Überlieferungs- und Gebrauchsspuren in historischen Buchbeständen.

Köln 2012.


Another thing which interests librarians are the book bindings. A number oflibrarians have published books on their most important book bindings. In addition,infor-


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mation on the cataloguing of bindings is stored both in a local and a central bookbinding data base located at the Staatsbibliothek Berlin.53 Aside from projects at thestate libraries, a special major focus is on many joint projects involving for examplethe HerzogAugust BibliothekWolfenbüttel, the Deutsches Buch- und Schriftmuseumand the Deutsches Literaturarchiv Marbach.54

Concluding remarks

Similar to libraries which tend to focus their attention on current issues involvingthe book trade, the teaching, study and research in the field of Buchwissenschaft inGermany has been increasingly devoting time and energy to the contemporary bookas a medium in its manifold medial environment, its choice in publishing,manufacturing and distribution including electronic formats and E-books. Of keyimportance is the topic or paradigm of change, which is not solely regarded as afast-paced technological structural upheaval in the book market. The implicationsof the socio-demographic changes for the book trade and the formats of age-dependentand generation-specific book usage are becoming increasingly important focuses inteaching and research. Aspects of a sustainable commercial trade in books by variousparticipants in the book trade as well as the ecological and climate-neutral productionof books andmedia products are fast becoming part of the Buchwissenschaft researchagenda. However, the study of the history of the book in libraries and similar scientificinstitutions has by no means come to a halt, indeed corresponding courses are stillbeing taught and students and graduates continue to write their doctoral theses andHabilitationsschriften. Having said that, the increased focus on a practical professionfor the graduates demands a greater emphasis on practical preparation for jobs in thepublishing industry and book trade.

53 www.hist-einband.de. See also R. Boeff, O. Flimm, ‘Von der traditionellen zur digitalenEinbandsammlung’, in: Bibliothek - Forschung und Praxis 30 (2006), 63-68.

54 See the collection of articles on the topic ‘Forschungsbibliotheken und Museen’, in:Rautenberg, Buchwissenschaft. Vol. 2, 945-1028.


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Peter R. Frank, Johannes Frimmel & Murray G. HallBook history in Austria

The history of the book in Austria has remained essentially uncharted territory evenfor scholars from neighbouring Germany. Therefore, this article begins with a briefhistorical introduction outlining the special conditions which influenced the courseof Austrian book history. This is followed by a presentation of the characteristics ofbook production under the given influences. Finally, reference will be made toimportant publications and research projects as well as fields of future research.

Austrian book history as a transnational challenge

If one were to compare Austrian book history with the same discipline in its oftenoverpowering neighbour Germany, one would soon become aware of the fundamentaldifferences between the two. Up until 1871, German history was marked by a sortof territorial fragmentation and thus there was a corresponding array of imperialresidences and centres of publishing. The population was, for all intents and purposes,German.On the other hand, the Habsburg Monarchy - administered from a central location

- was one of the largest European empires, in which the capital Vienna played apreeminent role. It was a multi-ethnic entity, with, among others, Austrian Germans,Jews, Poles, Ruthenians, Czechs, Slovaks, Italians, Croats, Slovenes, Serbs, andRomanians. Some fourteen languages were spoken andwritten in the realm. A Europein a nutshell.Vienna, where books were produced in almost all languages of the Habsburg

Monarchy, demonstrates this as a focal point. Though censorship was very rigid, agood deal of Viennese literature consisted of translations and of books in foreignlanguages. Thus Austrian publishing houses contributed substantially to culturaltransfer. The book trade in Vienna served as a type of hub for literary transfer withinthe Habsburg Monarchy. Writing the history of books of the Habsburg Monarchyalways means asking how print made it possible ‘to communicate with one anotherwithin a complex system determined by multi-ethnicity and multi-culturality’.1 It isthis aspect of the

1 M. Csáky, ‘Ambivalenz des kulturellen Erbes: Zentraleuropa’, in: M. Csáky, K. Zeyringer,Ambivalenz des kulturellen Erbes. Vielfachcodierung des historischen Gedächtnisses.Paradigma: Österreich. Innsbruck/Wien/München 2001, 27-49, here 30.


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book history of the Habsburg Monarchy that seems of particular interest for thedevelopment of new perspectives in book historiography. It becomes more and moreevident that the history of the book can only be written as a transnational history.Print culture did not only determine the way nations were defining themselves, itwas also crucial for cultural transmission.

Book production in Austria

Following the humble beginnings of book production during the age of Humanism(with printers and publishers such as Alantsee,Winterburger, Singriener), the Austrianbook trade was hampered in its development well on into the eighteenth century bythe effects of the massive Counter Reformation. State regimentation in the form ofexclusive printing rights or Privilegien and censorship dominated and inhibited thebook trade. Printed books were mostly commissioned by local or court patrons. Theat times oppressive censorship under the Catholic Habsburgs repeatedly impededand interrupted the development of strictly literary publishing companies in Austria.The brief impetus given to literature and the book trade under Emperor Joseph II(1780-1790) was cut short again during the repressive era that was to follow, and itwas only during the liberal phase that there were greater freedoms.The major strength - and this pertains especially to the publishing landscape in

the nineteenth century - was the publication of scholarly works and other non-fiction.Relatively early in the century, new publishing firms began to specialise, for example,in the fields of art and music (Artaria, Gerlach etc.), theatre literature (Wallishausser,L. Rosner), legal texts (Manz, Braumüller, Gerold etc.), medicine (Perles, Urban &Schwarzenberg etc.), cartography (Ed. Hölzel, Freytag & Berndt) and agriculture(Wilhelm Frick). Other notable publishers included Beck, A. Hartleben, Hölder,Deuticke, Pichler and Tempsky. Many of these firms produced a rich collection ofworks from the natural sciences, philosophy (Brentano, Bolzano), psychoanalysis(Freud, Adler) as well as texts dealing with history or economics (e.g. Alfred Arneth,Carl Menger, Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk, Richard Mises) and functional literature.Another characteristic which made the Austrian publishing landscape different

from the German one was the multitude of languages. In addition to the Germanimmigrants, the French, the Dutch, the Italians, the Greek and the Czechs all cameto leave their mark on the Austrian book trade. Texts in Latin and German wereproduced alongside those in Hebrew, Greek and in oriental tongues and, obviously,in all the languages of the Monarchy. The multi-ethnic aspect of the Austrian booktrade is also mirrored in the history of its professionalisation. Indeed, it was a Polishbookseller from Lviv (Lemberg) by the name ofMilikowski who called for the unionof all booksellers in theMonarchy as early as 1846. Then, in the year 1859, the Vereinder österreichischen Buchhändler (Association of Austrian book sellers) wasestablished. It was an organisation modelled on the German Börsenverein and drewits members from all corners of Habsburg empire. The official Austrian tradepublication, the Österreichische


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(later:Österreichisch-Ungarische)Buchhändler-Correspondenz began to appear thefollowing year.2

In 1840, Austria, which was by no means among the avant-garde in calling forbetter protection of intellectual property, signed the first international literaryconvention with Sardinia, thus paving the way for the long-awaited Imperial Patentof 1846 offering extended copyright protection.3 Despite repeated initiatives overthe years on the part of the Austrian book trade, the parliament of the dual monarchyfailed to pass legislation which would have anticipated Austria becoming a memberof the Berne Convention. Resistance came - among other places - from the aspiringpeoples of the vast Monarchy who did not want to pay royalties for translations intheir efforts to catch upwith other cultures. Copyright legislationwas instead regulatedby individual reciprocal agreements. Because Austria did not become a party to theBerne Convention, the works of Austrian writers and composers enjoyed lesscopyright protection at home and this led many of them to publish in Germany. Inthe words of one contemporary, Austrian writers were ‘free game’ for piratepublishers. It is not surprising then that this situation hampered the development ofa strictly literary publishing industry in Austria-Hungary. It was not until 1920 thatthe young Republic of Austria was forced under the terms of the peace treaty of St.Germain to join the Berne Convention.4

At the beginning of the First Republic in 1918, when many successful publishingcompanies had lost their traditional markets in the vast Monarchy (legal texts, schoolbooks and the like) and were forced to re-invent themselves, there was a short-livedboomwhich led to the foundation of countless new literary publishing houses. Manyof them, including ambitious share-holding companies such as WILA or the RikolaVerlag, had gone under by the middle of the decade. However, others, such as HerbertReichner, Paul Zsolnay or E.P. Tal, which had a foot on the German market, stayedin business until the annexation of Austria by Hitler Germany in March 1938. Ofthese three firms, only the Paul Zsolnay Verlag, which was subsequently ‘aryanised’during the Nazi period survived until after the Second World War. Its successfulprogrammewas based on international bestsellers and contemporaryGerman-languageliterature.5

2 As part of the project ANNO, Historische österreichische Zeitungen und Zeitschriften, theAustrian National Library is currently in the process of scanning and making accessibleonline its entire holdings of this trade publication from the year 1860.

3 For a detailed description see M.G. Hall, ‘Der Urheberrechtsvertrag zwischen Österreichund Sardinien (1840). Ein erster Versuch zur Regelung des internationalen literarischenTransfers’, in: N. Bachleitner, M.G. Hall (eds.), Die Bienen fremder Literaturen. Derliterarische Transfer zwischen Großbritannien, Frankreich und dem deutschsprachigenRaum im Zeitalter der Weltliteratur (1770-1850). Wiesbaden 2012, 275-295.

4 S. Gerhartl, ‘Vogelfrei’. Die österreichische Lösung der Urheberrechtsfrage in der 2. Hälftedes 19. Jahrhunderts oder Warum es Österreich unterließ, seine Autoren zu schützen.Unpublished dissertation. Wien 1995 (online at:www.wienbibliothek.at/doku-mente/gerhartl-sybille.pdf).

5 M.G. Hall, Österreichische Verlagsgeschichte, 1918-1938. Band I: Geschichte desösterreichischen Verlagswesens; Band II: Belletristische Verlage der Ersten Republik. Wien1985; available online: verlagsgeschichte.murrayhall.com.


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The status of the discipline

In contrast to the situation past and present in Germany, Book History has neverestablished itself as a field of study at Austrian institutions of higher learning. Thereis no ‘historical commission’ similar to the one established by the Börsenverein inGermany. Research on the book and publishing trade has generally been restrictedto the private initiative of individual scholars. There are however a number ofoutstanding examples of Austrian scholarship from the nineteenth century worthnoting. One is the comprehensive, two-volume history of book-printing in Viennaby Anton Mayer, Wiens Buchdrucker-Geschichte 1482-1882, as well as numerousimportant articles and brochures penned by Carl Junker.6 Roughly a hundred yearslater, Anton Durstmüller published a three-volume history of the printing trade inAustria under the title 500 Jahre Druck in Österreich.7 In the year 2000, N.Bachleitner, F.M. Eybl, and E. Fischer published a single volume history of the booktrade in Austria, which, naturally, restricts its scope to the German-Austrian region.8

It is worth mentioning that Austria brought forth a number of prominent librarians,bibliographers and book historians, among them Josef Körner, Wilhelm Kosch,Hanns Bohatta, Gustav Gugitz, Max von Portheim, Gert A. Zischka and Karl F.Stock.Despite various initiatives, the complicated historical situation of the Habsburg

Empire as a multi-ethnic and multi-national state was instrumental in the fact thatAustria did not have a national bibliography until 1946. This makes Austria one ofthe few European states lacking a retrospective bibliography. During the days of theMonarchy, national bibliographies of Polish (Estreicher) and Hungarian literature(Petrik) appeared, but all attempts at compiling a joint Austrian national bibliographycame to naught. The project of compiling an Austrian retrospective bibliographyÖsterreichische retrospektive Bibliographie (ORBI), which was begun at the AustrianNational Library and is restricted to publications within the territory of present-dayAustria, only comprises two series, edited by Helmut W. Lang, namely Series 2(newspapers) and 3 (periodicals). A continuation of the project appears unlikely. TheNational Library also publishes the journal Biblos. Beiträge zu Buch, Bibliothek undSchrift as well as the series Biblos Schriften. Based on the donation of the library ofPeter R. Frank, the Wienbibliothek im Rathaus (Vienna City Library) has beenendeavouring in recent years to establish a special Book History collection. It ishoped that the recent acquisition by the Austrian National Library of the archive ofthe Verein der österreichischen Buch-, Kunst- und Musikalienhändler (Associationof Austrian Booksellers) will provide further impulses for research.In order to create a common forum for book historians in Austria, Peter R. Frank

and Murray G. Hall founded the Gesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich in1998. Themain goal of the association is to initiate and promote book history researchprojects and to

6 A.Mayer,Wiens Buchdrucker-Geschichte 1482-1882. Wien 1883-1887; C. Junker, ed. M.H.Hall, Zum Buchwesen in Österreich. Gesammelte Schriften 1896-1927. Wien 2001.

7 A. Durstmüller d.J., 500 Jahre Druck in Österreich. Die Entwicklungsgeschichte dergraphischen Gewerbe von den Anfängen bis zur Gegenwart. 3 volumes, Wien [1982-1989].

8 N. Bachleitner [et al.], Geschichte des Buchhandels in Österreich. Wiesbaden 2000.


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encourage links with international research. Publications include the seriesBuchforschung. Beiträge zum Buchwesen in Österreich and the semi-annual journalMitteilungen der Gesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich. The association alsoregards itself as a platform for research into the history of the book throughout theentire Habsburg Monarchy up until 1918. In other words, this covers not only theGerman-Austrian region, but also the Slavic, Hungarian, Romanian, etc. book tradeand book production. The association's website features, among other things, a currentlist of all relevant theses pertaining to book history in Austria.9 Its concept of bookhistorical research is based on the communication cycle as developed by Herbert G.Göpfert and Robert Darnton. Robert Darnton defined book history in an article firstpublished in 1982 as ‘the social and cultural history of communication by print’,10

whereas Göpfert declared the communication cycle ‘vom Autor zum Leser’ as thefield of book history.11 The interests of the association encompass the entire spectrumof the book trade: from the author to the reader, institutions involved in the productionand dissemination of books - paper, binding, printing, retail book sellers, publishers,libraries, censorship etc. - and the printed works - books, newspapers, journals, sheetmusic, maps, posters, lithographs and so on.With the exception of the many publications of journalist and historian Carl Junker

(1864-1928), there was no real interest in nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuryAustria in the history of the book trade - neither on the part of scholars, nor on thepart of the trade association. Little changed in the decades after the Second WorldWar. Publishing history was mostly restricted to the history of newspapers orpublishers from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. It was not until the mid-1980sthat the focus of research finally turned to publishing history in Austria in the firsthalf of the twentieth century. The publication in 1985 of a two-volume history ofliterary publishing in the inter-war years by Murray G. Hall proved a turning point.12

It deals with topics such as National Socialism in Austria, the looting of books andthe ‘aryanisation’ of Jewish property, this belated interest has to be seen in the contextof the country's reluctance to deal with its Nazi past. This history gave rise to a largenumber of scholarly works at Austrian universities dealing with company historiesand the book trade in general, a considerable number of which are available as freedownloads at the website of the Wienbibliothek im Rathaus.Spurred on by the Art Restitution Law, passed in late 1998, the focus of research

has also turned to library history especially during the Nazi period in Austria(1938-1945) and to provenance research. One of the first major publications in thisfield was a comprehensive history of the National Library in Vienna during the years1938-1945.13 This

9 www.buchforschung.at.10 R. Darnton, ‘What is the history of books?’, in: D. Finkelstein, A. McCleery (eds.), The book

history reader. London/New York 2002, 9-26, here 9.11 H.G. Göpfert,VomAutor zum Leser. Beiträge zur Geschichte des Buchwesens. München/Wien

1977.12 Hall, Österreichische Verlagsgeschichte, 1918-1938.13 M.G. Hall, C. Köstner, ‘...allerlei für die Nationalbibliothek zu ergattern...’. Eine

österreichische Institution in der NS-ZeitWien/Köln/Weimar 2006.


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work also spawned provenance research projects at a variety of university, provincialand communal libraries throughout Austria (Vienna, Klagenfurt, Salzburg, Linz,Graz and Innsbruck).

Figure 1. Cover of P.R. Frank, J. Frimmel, Buchwesen in Wien 1750-1850. Wiesbaden 2008

This increased focus on what is essentially the history of the book has broughtforth numerous publications.14 Under the stewardship of Peter R. Frank, theGesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich initiated the project Topographie desBuchmarktes in der Habsburgermonarchie 1750-1850. Within the framework of theproject, the aim is to offer, for the first time, an overview of the book trade in theentire HabsburgMonarchy. The project documents the individual firms, their ownersand, in the case of larger companies, offers an overview of their production. Theentries also include information on the history of each company, addresses andbiographical details. A list of sources and archival material, catalogues andbibliographies as well as secondary literature serves to encourage further research.The compiled material is kept in a database and is also being published for selectedregions in book form. The first volume,

14 For example S. Alker [et al.] (eds.), Bibliotheken in der NS-Zeit. Provenienzforschung undBibliotheksgeschichte. Wien 2008; H. Bauer [et al.] (eds.), NS-Provenienzforschung anösterreichischen Bibliotheken. Anspruch undWirklichkeit. Wien 2011; K. Bergmann-Pfleger,Geschichte der Universitätsbibliothek Graz 1938-1945. Wiesbaden 2011; U. Schachl-Raber[et al.] (eds.), Buchraub in Salzburg. Bibliotheks- und NS-Provenienzforschung an derUniversitätsbibliothek Salzburg. Salzburg 2012.


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Peter R. Frank and Johannes Frimmel'sBuchwesen inWien, 1750-1850was publishedin 2008 and other volumes are planned for Prague and Bohemia as well asPressburg/Buda-Pest.15 As the first volume has demonstrated, this research opens upa fascinating perspective for the future by presenting the book history of the variouslands of the Habsburg Monarchy in context. Whereas scholars, and book historiansare no exception, have hitherto tended to focus on the history of nations, there is nowincreasing interest in examining the multi-ethnic realm as a common communicationarea. Furthermore, a history of the book in the Habsburg Monarchy could provideimportant impulses for a history of the European book trade. A joint repertory ofrelevant archival material, coordination of digitization projects and the retrospectivebibliographical compilation of book production would be the necessary prerequisites.

Figure 2. Cover of S. Alker [et al.] (eds), Bibliotheken in der NS-Zeit. Göttingen 2008

15 P.R. Frank, J. Frimmel, Buchwesen in Wien 1750-1850. Kommentiertes Verzeichnis derBuchdrucker, Buchhändler und Verleger. Wiesbaden 2008.


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Current trends and future perspectives

What would be desirable in the field of Austrian book research is a more vigorousmethodological discussion, which should address the social and cultural ramificationsof book printing in the larger context of media history. Book production figures forAustria up until 1918 are completely inadequate and at times misleading becausethey only list German-language book production and ignore the substantial amountof books printed in Slavic languages or in Hungarian. Among the projects whichwould be of major importance are a compilation of the data from the variousretrospective national bibliographies (such as Hungary, the Czech Republic andSlovakia) and a resumption of the Austrian Retrospective Bibliography ORBI. Withoutthe corresponding bibliographical data, definitive conclusions about the developmentof the Austrian book production and any comparisons with the German book marketwill rest on insecure foundations.More attention should be paid to linking bibliographical work to publishing and

social history, as is common among scholars in English-speaking countries andFrance. Included among the issues to be addressed is the connection between themateriality of the book as an object and differing reading practices. An analysis ofthe massive piracy production in the Habsburg Monarchy in the eighteenth andnineteenth centuries for example may prove highly enlightening for interactions withprint in a transnational context. The practice of reprints should be studied in moredetail under the aspect of how the reception of books and book design were connected.Paratexts, abridgements, adaptations, illustrations, format and typography couldinform us about reading practices. Another aspect is the connection between printingand emerging national identities on the basis of the ethnic groups within the HabsburgMonarchy, whose book production experienced a renaissance from the eighteenthcentury onwards. Another issue to be addressed is the relationship between oral,hand-written and printed communication. From the eighteenth to the twentieth century,Vienna was an expanding multiethnic capital in which different social groupscommunicated by a variety of media within different communication spheres. Itsinhabitants found themselves in a complex and polyphonic cultural situation ofoverlapping and rivalling spheres of communication.Various impulses for new methodological aspects are to be found, for example,

in a recent publication edited by Samo Kobenter and Peter Plener under the titleSeitenweise. Was das Buch ist.16 The topics dealt with in this collection of essaysinclude the history of types and printing as factors influencing reading, the relationshipbetween print and body as well as reading from a phenomenological perspective, theuses of books as well as library and bibliophile classification systems.

16 T. Eder [et al.] (eds.), Seitenweise. Was das Buch ist. Wien 2010.


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Benito Rial CostasBibliography and the history of the printed book in SpainSome insights into an old and new field of studyIn memory of professor José Simón Díaz (1920-2012)

Writing about the progress of bibliography and the history of the book in Spain isnot an easy task. Only bibliography as a discipline or field of study has been frequentlyused and defined to any degree by Spanish scholars. The ‘history of the book’ as anexpression denoting a discipline (hereafter book history) is still today, in internationalforums, far from having a coherent and unanimously accepted definition. Indeed, inSpain, the term is not even used to denote a discipline. Condensing in a few pagesthe complex history, internally interacting forces and current situation of bothbibliography and the elusive field of book history in Spain is impossible withoutover-simplifying matters, deploying unacceptable generalisations, and overlookingimportant factors and events.1

In trying to avoid, or perhaps in spite of, these risks, I will concentrate in this paperon bibliography in Spain, showing its history, goals and approach to the history ofthe printed book - bibliography being the only discipline that, arbitrarily or not, hastraditionally considered it. Bibliography, in Spain, has been the only discipline that,from its

1 According to Robert Darnton, book history studies ‘the social and cultural history ofcommunication by print’; see R. Darnton, ‘What is the history of books?’, in: K. Carpenter(ed.), Books and society in history. New York 1983, 3. However, according to the Societyfor the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing (SHARP), book history studies ‘thecomposition, mediation, reception, survival, and transformation of written communicationinmaterial forms includingmarks on stone, script on parchment, printed books and periodicals,and new media’; see www.sharpweb.org/, accessed 29 October, 2012. See also T.R. Adams,N. Barker, ‘A new model for the study of the book’, in: N. Barker (ed.), A potencie of life.Books in society. London 1993, 5-43; D.D. Hall, ‘The history of the book. New questions?New answers?’, in: Journal of library history 21 (1986) 1, 27-38; G.T. Tanselle, ‘Printinghistory and other history’, in: Studies in bibliography 48 (1995), 269-289; P.D. McDonald,‘Implicit structures and explicit interactions. Pierre Bourdieu and the history of the book’,in: The library 19 (1997) 2, 105-121; J. Jenisch,‘The history of the book. Introduction,overview, apologia’, in: Portal: Libraries and the academy 3 (2003) 2, 229-239; D.Finkelstein, A.McCleery, An introduction to book history. NewYork/London 2005. FrançoisLópez and Mercedes Dexeus, among other Spanish scholars, use the term ‘book history’,but they identify it, to a certain extent, with bibliography. See F. López, ‘Estado actual de lahistoria del libro en España’, in: Revista de historia moderna 4 (1984), 9-22; M. Dexeus,‘Diez años de historia del libro y las bibliotecas en España 1983-93’, in: Boletín ANABAD44 (1994), 140-160. For a different Spanish perspective, see M.L. López-Vidriero, ‘Losestudios de historia del libro en España durante el siglo XX’, in: La bibliofilia 102 (2000) 1,123-135. For an identification of the responsibilities of historical bibliography with those ofbook history, see R. Stokes, The function of bibliography. London 1969, 160-170.


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origins, has made the history of printed books one of its main interests. Bibliography'sapproach to the history of the printed book, however, is today facing importantchallenges from several scholarly initiatives that could be labeled as book history.

Bibliography, librarianship and literary studies: a little bit of history

From 1821 throughout the whole nineteenth century a bibliography course was partof the curricula of several studies. A Chair of Bibliography, as an auxiliary science,was created in studies such as medicine, pharmacy and law. Bibliography was mainlytaught by librarians, but the meaning of the word was still far from the moderndefinition because the function of its practitioners was to teach the history andliterature of those respective subjects.2

In 1856, the Escuela Superior de Diplomática was founded in Madrid for teachingand training future librarians, archivists and antiquarians. Its curricula included‘Bibliography: Classification and Arrangement of Archives and Libraries.’ Thiscourse included the study of both the history of printing and the theoretical andpractical notions for classifying and arranging archival and library holdings.3 In 1900,the School was closed, and the Chair of Bibliography and its teachers joined theDepartment of Literary Studies of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras at the Universityof Madrid where they continued their activities.4

In 1953, the Escuela de Formación Técnica de Archiveros, Bibliotecarios yArqueólogos, inheritor of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática's objectives andcurricula, opened in Madrid. In 1964, it was transformed into the Escuela deDocumentalistas. In 1981, it was renamed Centro de Estudios Bibliográficos yDocumentarios (CEBID), ceasing its activities when university schools of library andinformation science started to be opened a few years later.None of the reforms that the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras made after the Escuela

Superior de Diplomática was closed affected the Chair of Bibliography, but theChair's work, for various reasons, did not achieve great importance within the Facultyuntil 1971. Because of the poor activity of the Chair, the only one in Spain, theFaculty of Filosofía y Letras decided, in 1956, to establish a Bibliography of Spanishliterature course within the Department of Romance Philology. José Simón Díaztaught this course from 1956 to 1970, when he became head of the Chair ofBibliography. At the same time, in the faculties of philosophy and arts of severalSpanish provinces, the basic principles and applications of this new discipline startedto be taught, albeit under dif-

2 M.T. Fernández Bajón, ‘La enseñanza de la bibliografía en el siglo XIX’, in: Homenaje aJuan Antonio Sagredo Fernández. Estudios de bibliografía y fuentes de información. Madrid2001, 177-195.

3 See J. Simón Díaz, La bibliografía. Conceptos y aplicaciones. Barcelona 1971, 40-41;Fernández Bajón, ‘La ensenañza de la bibliografía’, 188, 194-204, 212-213. See also F. delos Reyes Gómez, ‘La historia de la imprenta en los estudios de bibliografía: Toribio delCampillo’, in: Homenaje a Juan Antonio Sagredo Fernández, 477-517.

4 Simón Díaz, La bibliografía, 33, 42; Fernández Bajón, ‘La enseñanza de la bibliografía’,193-215.


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ferent names, almost always by librarians.5 The connection between bibliographyand the Department of Literary Studies of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras at theUniversity of Madrid resulted in the introduction and application in Spain (by JaimeMoll in 1979) of the bibliographic principles of Fredson Bowers and the contributionsof Wallace Kirsop and Roger Laufer. These provided a new tool for literary studiesand expanded the significance of bibliography.6

In 1857, one year after the Escuela Superior de Diplomática was created inMadrid,the National Library of Spain established an annual bibliographical award. This wasanother fundamental milestone in the history of Spanish bibliography, especially, inone of its most important tasks: collecting and cataloguing the printed production ofa given place. This municipally or regionally-oriented approach would be later called,by Spanish bibliographers, ‘tipobibliografía’ (hereafter, typobibliography).7 In 1863,the award was given to Francisco Escudero y Perosso for his work on Seville(Tipografía hispalense) and, three years later, to Bonifacio María Riano for his workon Granada (Bibliografía granadina).8

Figure 1. Francisco Escudero y Perosso, Tipografía hispalense. Anales bibliográficos de la ciudadde Sevilla desde el establecimiento de la imprenta hasta fines del siglo XVIII. Madrid 1894

5 Simón Díaz, La bibliografía, 35, 37, 42. See also J. Simón Díaz, ‘El Departamento deBibliografía de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid’, in:Documentación de las Cienciasde la Información 1 (1976), 17-21; ‘Bio-bibliografía de José SimónDíaz’, in:Documentaciónde las Ciencias de la Información 10 (1986), 11-42.

6 The turning point for this process was the publication of the article of J. Moll, ‘Problemasbibliográficos del libro del Siglo de Oro’, in: Boletín de la Real Academia Española 59(1979), 49-107.

7 J. Delgado Casado, Un siglo de bibliografía en España. Los concursos bibliográficos de laBiblioteca Nacional (1857-1953). Madrid 2001, vol. 1, 41, 150.

8 F. Escudero y Perosso, Tipografía hispalense. Anales bibliográficos de la ciudad de Sevilladesde el establecimiento de la imprenta hasta fines del siglo XVIII. Madrid 1894; B. MaríaRiano, Bibliografía granadina y noticias históricas de su imprenta e impresores hasta finesdel siglo XVIII. Unpublished. National Library of Spain, manuscript number 21.464. See J.Delgado Casado, ‘Los comienzos de la tipobibliografía regional y local española’, in:Homenaje a Juan Antonio Sagredo Fernández, 128-129.


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The enthusiasm produced by Riano's work led the National Library to establish aspecial award for typobibliographies. Although this initiative did not get immediateresults, these kinds of works remained a constant factor in all National Library'sannual bibliographical awards for nearly a century. The bibliographical award of theNational Library of Spain was last granted in 1953, but the relation betweenbibliography and typobibliographies would be inherited by the project TipobibliografíaEspañola thirty years later.9

The project Tipobibliografía Española was born in the years 1983 and 1984. Thefirst and second Reunión de Especialistas en Bibliografía Local were respectivelyheld in 1983 and 1984, convened by the Confederación Española de Centros deEstudios Locales of the Centro Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC) andby the Department of Bibliography of the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras of theUniversity Complutense of Madrid. The initiative and ideas of Simón Díaz, thetwentieth-century's most respected theorist of bibliography in Spain, wereinstrumental. In both of those years, a decision was made to undertake the projectof creating typobibliographies of the whole Spanish territory following a rigorousand systematic plan and a common methodology. It was made with an awareness ofthe enormous value that this information would have for several disciplines.10

The Asociación Española de Bibliografía was created few years later - in 1987 -on the initiative of a group of specialists of the National Library of Spain and themembers of the project Tipobibliografía Española. Its creationwas intended to remedythe lack of a society which brought together the experts in a field with more thantwo centuries of history and which, through SimónDíaz's work and teaching, as headof the Chair of Bibliography at the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras of the UniversityComplutense of Madrid, was the center of great interest among Spanish librariansand literary scholars. The Asociación Española de Bibliografía condensed andsummarised the history of bibliography in Spain and its close relations withlibrarianship, literary studies and especially typobibliographies. In 1988, the societywas formally constituted with a clear objective. Its main purpose would be promotingand studying Spanish hand-press printed production by finding, describing andanalyzing libraries' holdings and by creating catalogues, inventories and monographson the subject.11

The Asociación Española de Bibliografía tried to promote the membership of thesociety among those national and foreign specialists, mainly librarians and literaryscholars, who were willing to collaborate with it in accordance with its objective.This objective of finding, describing and analysing Spanish hand-press printedproduction, however, did not reflect the aims of many scholars interested in thehistory of the print-

9 D. Casado, ‘Los comienzos de la tipobibliografía’, 130, 132.10 Although the project was initially conceived for the sixteenth century, it was later expanded

to the whole hand-press period. See J. Simón Díaz, ‘Introducción a la “TipobibliografíaEspañola”’, in: J. Martín Abad, La imprenta en Alcalá de Henares (1502-1600). Madrid1991, vol. 1, 7-15.

11 Trabajos de la Asociación Española de Bibliografía I. Madrid 1993, 9. Following Paul Otletand Henri La Fontaine's model and quoting Louise Noëlle Malclès, Simón Díaz wrote in1971 that bibliography was an auxiliary science and that its main purpose was to collect,describe, classify and catalogue printed documents. See Simón Díaz, La bibliografía, 17-19.


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ed book. With this aim, many different interests and research lines which, in thoseyears, were beginning to develop around the study of the book and print and writtenculture were explicitly excluded.The long relations between bibliography, librarianship and literary studies and

their developments and exclusions have also been reflected in the publishingmarket.12

During the nineteenth century, the National Library of Spain's bibliographic awardand the work of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática had, especially from the secondhalf of the century, a strong influence on the publishing development of these typesof works. The works of Fermín Caballero on the printing press in Cuenca, CristóbalPérez Pastor on Toledo and Medina del Campo, Francisco Escudero on Seville, andJosé María Valdenebro on Córdoba are just a few examples.13

During the following century, the tendency of publishing typobibliographiescontinued. Two of the most representative works of Spanish bibliography werepublished, namely Konrad Haebler's Bibliografía ibérica del siglo XV and FrederickJ. Norton's A descriptive catalogue of printing in Spain and Portugal.14 A numberof scholarly journals started to appear sporadically: Papyrus in 1936, Revista debiblíografía nacional from 1940 to 1946, Bibliofilia from 1949 to 1957, Cuadernosde bibliofilia from 1979 to 1987, Esopo from 1990 to 1992, and Pliegos de bibliofiliafrom 1998 to 2004.15

In addition, iconic international works such as Ronald B. McKerrow's Anintroduction to bibliography of 1928 and Philip Gaskell's A new introduction tobibliography of 1972 were translated into Spanish, albeit only at the very end of thecentury.16 Fredson Bower's Principles of bibliographical description of 1949 had towait until 2001 to be published in Spanish.17

12 Several works on printed books and their catalogues had already been published at the endof the eighteenth century, such as N. Antonio, Biblioteca Hispana nova, sive Hispanorumscriptorum qui ab anno MD ad MDCLXXXIV fluere notitia. Matriti: apud Joachimum deIbarra, 1738-1788; J. Villarroya, Disertación sobre el origen del nobilisimo arte tipográficoy su introduccióny uso en la ciudad de Valencia de los Edetanos. Valencia: Benito Monfort,1796; and F. Méndez, Typographía española o historia de la introducción, propagación yprogresos del arte de la imprenta en España. Madrid: Viuda de Joachin Ibarra, 1796. I amleaving aside printing manuals and historical works with short notices about the history ofbooks such as A. Víctor de Paredes' Institución y origen del arte de la imprenta of 1680 andH. Flórez's España Sagrada of 1789.

13 F. Caballero, La imprenta en Cuenca. Datos para la historia del arte tipográfico en España.Cuenca 1869; C. Pérez Pastor, La imprenta en Toledo. Descripción bibliográfica de las obrasimpresas en la imperial ciudad desde 1483 hasta nuestros días. Madrid 1887; C. PérezPastor, La imprenta en Medina del Campo. Madrid 1895; F. Escudero y Perosso, Tipografíahispalense. Anales bibliográficos de la ciudad de Sevilla desde el establecimiento de laimprenta hasta fines del siglo XVIII. Madrid 1894; J.M. de Valdenebro y Cisneros, Laimprenta en Córdoba: ensayo bibliográfico. Madrid 1900.

14 K. Haebler, Bibliografía ibérica del siglo XV. Enumeración de todos los libros impresos enEspaña y Portugal hasta el año de 1500. Leipzig/La Haya 1903; K. Haebler, BibliografíaIbérica del siglo XV o hispánica. Segunda parte. Leipzig/La Haya 1917; F.J. Norton, Adescriptive catalogue of printing in Spain and Portugal 1501-1520. Cambridge 1978.

15 For a short list of journals see M.J. Pedraza Gracia [et al.], El Libro antiguo. Madrid 2003,399-400.

16 R.B. McKerrow, Introducción a la bibliografía material. Madrid 1998; Ph. Gaskell, Nuevaintroducción a la bibliografía material. Gijón 1999.

17 F. Bowers, Principios de descripción bibliográfica. Madrid 2001.


In the first half of the century, JuanManuel Sánchez published a typobibliographyof Aragon (1913), Ángel del Arco y Molinero one of Tarragona (1916), MarianoAlcocer y Martínez one of Valladolid (1926), Antonio Rodríguez Moñino one ofJerez (1942) and one


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of Extremadura (1945), and Atanasio López one of Galicia (1953).18

Figure 2. Pliegos de biblioflia 23 (2003)

At the end of the century, the project Tipobibliografía Española and the work andteaching of José Simón Díaz began to produce their first published results in workssuch as Julián Martín Abad's La imprenta en Alcalá de Henares (1991), LorenzoRuiz Fidalgo's La imprenta en Salamanca (1994) and Fermín de los Reyes' Laimprenta en Segovia (1996).19 However, many works published during the secondhalf of the twentieth century, and especially at its end, started to be very challengingfor bibliography's objective since many different scholarly interests and researchlines were beginning to develop around the study of the printed book beyondlibrarianship, literary studies and typobibliographies. For example, Juan DelgadoCasado studied bookplates, José BonifacioMartín Bermejo bookbindings, and authorssuch as Antonio Klaus Wagner, Clive Griffin and José Antonio

18 J. Manuel Sánchez, Bibliografía aragonesa del siglo XVI. 2 vols., Madrid 1913-1914; Á. delArco y Molinero, La imprenta en Tarragona. Apuntes para su historia y bibliografía.Tarragona 1916;M. Alcocer yMartínez,Catálogo razonado de obras impresas en Valladolid1481-1800. Valladolid 1826; A. Rodríguez Moñino, La imprenta xerezana en los siglos XVIy XVII (1564-1699). Madrid 1942; A. Rodríguez Moñino, La imprenta en Extremadura(1489-1800). Madrid 1945; A. López, La imprenta en Galicia Siglos XV-XVIII. Madrid 1953.

19 J. Martín Abad, La imprenta en Alcalá de Henares (1502-1600). 3 vols., Madrid 1991; L.Ruiz Fidalgo, La imprenta en Salamanca (1501-1600). 3 vols., Madrid 1994; F. de los Reyes,La imprenta en Segovia (1472-1900). 2 vols., Madrid 1996.


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Armendáriz studied the work of single printers.20 In the last decades of the century,works on the printing press, book selling and private libraries based on documentalsources were frequently published, and the terms ‘culture’, ‘writing’, ‘reading’ and‘readers’ began to be used.21 In 1976, Maxime Chevalier published his Lectura ylectores en la España de los siglos XVI y XVII; in 1980, the conference Livre etlecture en Espagne et en France sous l'Ancien Régime was held in Madrid and in1986 El libro antiguo español; in 1987, Philippe Berger published his Libro y lecturaen la Valencia del Renacimiento; in 1992 Fernando Bouza Álvarez published hisDel escribano a la biblioteca; and in 1997 Antonio Castillo Gómez shared hisEscrituras y escribientes with the scholarly world.22

Figure 3. Livre et lecture en Epagne et en Trance sous l'Ancien Régime. Paris 1981

20 J. Delgado Casado, Los ex libris españoles. Valencia 1996; J.B. Bermejo Martín (ed.),Enciclopedia de la encuadernación. Madrid 1998; K. Wagner, Martín de Montesdoca y suprensa. Contribución al estudio de la imprenta y de la bibliografía sevillanas del siglo XVI.Sevilla 1982; C. Griffin, The Crombergers of Sevilla. The history of a printing and merchantdynasty. Oxford 1988; J.A. Mosquera Armendáriz, Compendio de la vida y obra de A.G.Brocar. Pamplona 1989.

21 Juan Delgado Casado labels this trend ‘book culture’ although he does not define the term(J. Delgado Casado, Introducción a la Bibliografía. Los repertorios bibliográficos y suelaboraciónMadrid 2005, 189). Some of these works are A. Rojo Vega, Ciencia y culturaen Valladolid. Estudio de las bibliotecas privadas de los siglos XVI y XVII. Valladolid 1985;M. del Carmen Álvarez Márquez, El mundo del libro en la Iglesia Catedral de Sevilla en elsiglo XVI. Sevilla 1992; J. García Oro, Los Reyes y los libros. La política libraria de laCorona en el Siglo de Oro (1475-1598). Madrid 1995; M. Peña Díaz, El laberinto de loslibros. Histona cultural de la Barcelona del Quinientos. Madrid 1997; M.J. Pedraza Gracia,La producción y distribución del libro en Zaragoza: 1501-1521. Zaragoza 1997; M. de laManoGonzález,Mercaderes e impresores de libros en la Salamanca del siglo XVI. Salamanca1998; V. Bécares Botas, Arias Montano y Plantino. El libro flamenco en la España de FelipeII. León 1999; J.M. Prieto Bernabé, La seducción de papel El libro y la lectura en la Españadel Siglo de Oro. Madrid 2000; F. de los Reyes Gómez, El libro en España y América.Legislación y censura (siglos XV-XVIII). 2 vols., Madrid 2000.

22 M. Chevalier, Lectura y lectores en la España del siglo XVI y XVII. Madrid 1976; Livre etlecture en Espagne et en France sous l'Ancien Régime. Paris 1981; M.L. López-Vidriero,P.M. Cátedra (eds.), El libro antiguo español. Actas del primer coloquio internacional(Madrid 18 al 20 de diciembre de 1986). Salamanca/Madrid 1988; Ph. Berger, Libro y lecturaen la Valencia del Renacimiento. 2 vols., Valencia 1987; F. Bouza Álvarez, Del escribanoa la biblioteca. La civilización escrita europea en la Alta Edad Moderna (siglos XV-XVII).Madrid 1992; A. Castillo Gómez, Escrituras y escribientes: prácticas de la cultura escritaen una ciudad del Renacimiento. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria 1997.


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Some of these works had their genesis in bibliography's interest in the history of theprinted book among librarians and literary scholars. Others, however, were not relatedto this discipline, but were instead written by historians who viewed the printed (andwritten) book as an important element for the analysis of certain social, political,economic and cultural environments.

An old (and new) field of study

The current situation of Spanish bibliography and its interests are logical consequencesof its history. The university faculties of library and information science are, today,the centers devoted to professional training and research in the field of librarianshipand, therefore, the latest inheritors of the Escuela Superior de Diplomática and theclose relation between bibliography and librarianship. The faculties of library andinformation sciences as well as university departments of literary studies remain twoof bibliography's major strongholds. The project of Tipobibliografía Españolacontinues to add new works, although at a slower pace than in its early years, fillingthe lacunas in bibliography that François López pointed out in 1984.23 Francisco Ricois one of the main figures studying the relation between bibliography and textualcriticism in literary studies.24 The Asociación Española de Bibliografía continues itsactivities and its annual conferences.25 The bibliographical award of the NationalLibrary of Spain has been re-established and the Asociación Española de Bibliografíaplays an important role in it.26 Publishing houses such as Arco Libros, Calambur,Ollero y Ramos and Trea, among others, invest in works on the history of the book.But bibliography, today, is facing an important challenge. The lines of research

and interests which were born at the end of the twentieth century continually offernew contributions to the study of printing, writing, reading and bookselling.27 Somecontri-

23 F. López, ‘Estado actual de la historia del libro’, in: Revista de historia moderna 4 (1984),9-22. Some of these works are P. Alfaro Torres, La imprenta en Cuenca, 1528-1679. Madrid2002; M. Fernández Valladares, La imprenta en Burgos (1501-1600). 2 vols., Madrid 2005.

24 F. Rico (ed.), Imprenta y crítica textual en el Siglo de Oro. Valladolid 2000; F. Rico, Entorno al error. Copistas, tipógrafos, filologías. Madrid 2004.

25 The Asociación Española de Bibliografía has organised thirteen annual conferences. Despiteits initial objective of publishing the proceedings of all conferences, only three volumes havebeen published. The first volume of proceedings which included the comunications of thefirst and second conferences already explained the problems that the publication faced andthe impossibility of guaranteeing their periodicity. See Trabajos de la Asociación Españolade Bibliografía I, 8.

26 J. Delgado Casado, Un siglo de bibliografía, 152-153; id., ‘Los comienzos de latipobibliografia regional y local española’, in:Homenaje a Juan Antonio Sagredo Fernández,127.

27 Some examples are F. Bouza Álvarez, Corre manuscrito. Una historia cultural del Siglo deOro. Madrid 2002; C.A. González Sánchez, N. Maillard Álvarez, Orbe tipográfico. Elmercado del libro en la Sevilla de la segunda mitad del siglo XVI. Gijón 2003; P.M. Cátedra,A. Rojo Vega, Bibliotecas y lecturas de mujeres. Siglo XVI. Salamanca 2004; J.M. PrietoBernabé, Lectura y lectores. La cultura del impreso en el Madrid del Siglo de Oro(1550-1650). 2 vols., Mérida 2004; V. Bécares Botas, Guía documental del mundo del librosalmantino del siglo XVI. Burgos 2006; A. Castillo Gómez, Entre la pluma y la pared. Una


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butions on the printed book are presented as part of bibliography as a discipline whentheir authors are library science and literary scholars. Papers presented at theAsociación Española de Bibliografía conferences provide evidence of this.28 Manyothers, however, often written by historians, do not, even though their authors arealso interested in the history of the printed book. One might note, for example, theworks of García Oro, Fernando Bouza, Alberto González and Natalia Maillard.29

Two are the main causes of this phenomenon: bibliography's tradition and the lackof a contemporary theoretical formulation of the discipline. As Simón Díaz noted inLa bibliografía of 1971, the origins of bibliography have transmitted the messagethat the only function of the discipline is the training of future librarians, while itsrelation with the Faculty of Filosofía y Letras has shaped its development towardsthat of literary studies.30 Today it can be added that the bibliographical awards of theNational Library of Spain, Simón Díaz's work, the project of TipobibliografíaEspañola and the Asociación Española de Bibliografía's objective have conveyedthe idea that the main function of the discipline is to describe and catalogue printedbooks.Despite the fact that a myriad of new different interests and research trends have

made inroads into the history of the printed book in recent years, bibliography hasnot given a theoretical response to the challenges the field is facing, nor has it clearlystated what the responsibilities of the discipline are and what they are not. SimónDíaz's La bibliografía remains the most important reference for the definition of theterm and its boundaries in Spain despite the fact that Simón Diaz's interests andvisions about the history of the printed book in 1971 were very different from thosebibliography is facing today.31

As a consequence, on the one hand, bibliography and its practitioners increasinglyshow signs of being interested in many different aspects of the printed book,independently of the perspective that is used. In this sense, the boundaries betweenan old librarianship-literary studies paradigm and new interests about the printedbook among librarians and literary scholars are, at least in practice, gradually fadingwithin the discipline as the papers presented at the Asociación Española deBibliografía conferences demonstrate.32 On the other hand, many historians seebibliography as a library and literary discipline where the printed book is only a toolto reach largely nineteenth-century goals, and they see the inroads of a historicalnature that bibliographers have made as a kind of intrusion into their area of expertise.Bibliography stands, at this point, at a crossroads. Avoiding a choice of direction

will enable bibliography to be open to many new interests about the history of the

historia social de la escritura en los Siglos de Oro. Madrid 2006; J.L. GonzaloSánchez-Molero,El Cesar y los libros. Un viaje a través de las lecturas del emperador desdeGante a Yuste. Cáceres 2008; F. Bouza Álvarez,Papeles y oppinión. Políticas de publicaciónen el Siglo de Oro. Madrid 2008.

28 See, for example, Trabajos de la VIII Reunión de la Asociación Española de Bibliografía(2003). Madrid 2004.

29 See footnote 27.30 Simón Díaz, La bibliografía, 43.31 See, for example, I. de Torres Ramírez, Bibliografía, la palabra y concepto. Granada 1990;

J. López Yepes, ‘Introducción al concepto de Bibliografía’, in: Fundamentos de informacióny documentación. Madrid 1989, 87-98.

32 See footnote 28.


printed book far beyond collecting and cataloging printed books, but it will also leadmost historians interested in those books to still perceive the discipline as a strongholdof librar-


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ian and literary principles and objectives which they do not share. If bibliographychooses, instead, the theoretical clarity akin in strength to that of Simón Díaz, itsboundaries will be clearly defined, but many recent works on the history of the printedbook written by librarians and literary scholars would not be considered part of thediscipline as they are today. Being clearly open to new interests and coherentlyredefining what the new responsibilities of the discipline are concerning the historyof the printed book and what they are not will also not be an easy path. Unity can beattractive, but the distance between bibliography and, for example, the current researchconducted by some historians in reading and written culture is big, despite both thefact that those historians also consider the printed book part of their interests and thefact that their innovative work would be perceived in international forums as part ofbook history.33 Research in reading and written culture also has its own andindependent history. In the last twenty years, historians interested in reading andwritten culture have had their own initiatives. In 1993, a series of internationalconferences about reading and written culture began to be organised, the journalSigno was born around the same time, and, in 2004, the Seminario Interdisciplinarde Estudios sobre Cultura Escrita of the University of Alcalá de Henares began itsactivities.34

Figure 4. El libro antiguo español. Actas del primer coloquio internacional. Salamanca/Madrid 1988

The lack of unity and interrelations between different interests in the history ofthe book seemed to have been solved in 1987 with the creation of the SociedadEspañola de Historia del Libro. In 1986, the National Library of Spain held aninternational confer-

33 See footnote 1.34 See www.siece.es/index.html, accessed 29 October 2012.


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ence titled El libro antiguo español at which prominent historians, librarians andliterary scholars took part.This conference led to the creation, one year later, of the Sociedad Española de

Historia del Libro, which, with the turn of the century, became the Instituto de Historiadel Libro y de la Lectura, directed by María Luisa López-Vidriero and Pedro M.Cátedra.35 In 2002, its first international conference was organised, the first issue ofits annual journal, Syntagma, was published and a collection of publications centeredon the history of the book, reading and writing was initiated.36 In spite of its ambitions,the Instituto de Historia del Libro y de la Lectura could never fully accomplish itsplans.37 In 2006, it was absorbed into the Instituto Biblioteca Hispánica of the CentroInternacional de Investigación para la Lengua Española and the cohesion betweenscholars interested in the history of the book lost one of its most promising features.Whatever the road bibliography will take - changing or confirming Simón Díaz's

definition - it will not be an easy journey. Although bibliography chose the historyof the printed book as one of its main interests in its early years, the history ofbibliography and the teaching of this discipline have greatly determined both itsapproach to the topic and how the discipline has been perceived (as librarian andliterary). Until a decision is made, the history of the printed book will continue to bean old and central field of study for bibliography, but a new history of the printedbook will continue to circulate within and around the discipline.

35 See www.fds.es/es/contenido/?iddoc=1190, accessed 29 October 2012.36 See, for example, M.L. López-Vidriero, P.M. Cátedra (eds.), El libro antiguo español IV.

Coleccionismo y biblioteca (siglos XV-XVIII). Salamanca 1998, 11; M.L. López-Vidriero,P.M. Cátedra (eds.), El libro antiguo español VI. De libros, librerías, imprentas y lectores.Salamanca 2002, 11; ‘Reglamento de funcionamiento del Instituto de Historia del Libro yde la Lectura’, in: Syntagma: Revista del Instituto de Historia del Libro y de la Lectura o(2002), 14-16; P.M. Cátedra, M.L. López-Vidriero (eds.), La memoria de los libros. Estudiossobre la historia del escrito y de la lectura en Europa y América. Salamanca 2004, vol. 1,13-14.

37 Only three issues of Syntagma were published and the two last books of the Instituto deHistoria del Libro y de la Lectura were published in 2006 and 2009. Seecampus.usal.es/~semyr/publicaciones-ihll-central.htm, accessed 29 October 2012.


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Stijn van RossemBook history in BelgiumWho harbours the harbourless?

On 28 November 2003 the Flanders Book Historical Society organised a conferenceentitled ‘Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen. Nieuwe instrumenten en benaderingen’(‘Book History in Flanders. New instruments and approaches’). The initiative forthis conference was the completion of the first phase of the Flemish Short-TitleCatalogue (STCV), the first online retrospective bibliography of the hand press bookin Flanders.1 Even people who could not attend can still get a sense of the optimismthat surrounded that day in the acts of the colloquium.2 The back cover of thepublication humbly states that even though book history in Belgium has not yet takena big leap forward compared to its neighbouring countries, this publication provedthat the ‘boekgeschiedenis nieuwe stijl’ (‘new-style book history’) had arrived inFlanders.The first speaker was Pierre Delsaerdt, at the time head of the Historical collections

of the University of Antwerp and president of the Flanders Book Historical Society.In his talk he gave an overview of book historical research in Flanders by using the‘Kroniek van het gedrukte boek in de Nederlanden tot 2000’.3 The ‘Kroniek’ is abibliography that was started in 1971 by Jeroom Machiels in Archief- enBibliotheekwezen in België and that contains bibliographical references and a concisereview of the most important book historical publications on Belgian topics.4 Usingthis unique tool, Delsaerdt painted a moderately positive image of book history inFlanders. Delsaerdt remarked that studies on book production in the fifteenth,sixteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries were quite well covered. However hefound our knowledge of the other two angles of the book historical triangle,distribution and consumption, to be very limited. Furthermore, he stated that bookhistory in Flanders needed to leave the safety of its own ideological living room andreach out to other disciplines. Too often, book historians wrote only in their ownjournals and the occasional festschrift, this way largely staying under the academicradar

1 Since the project was sponsored by the Flemish Research Council or FWO, the scope of theproject was confined to the Flemish-speaking area of Belgium.

2 P. Delsaerdt, K. de Vlieger-De Wilde (eds.), Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen: nieuweinstrumenten en benaderingen. Brussel 2004.

3 P. Delsaerdt, ‘Dertigjaar boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen. Enkele aantekeningen bij de“Kroniek van het gedrukte boek in de Nederlanden”’, in: Delsaerdt, De Vlieger-De Wilde,Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen, 9-13.

4 Most recent ‘Kroniek’, in: Archief- en bibliotheekwezen in België 82 (2011) 1-4, 202-254.


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and denying visibility to the field. Finally, book history needed to be implementedin an institution to ensure its future. Delsaerdt saw possibilities in a yet-to-be-erectedInstitute for book history (following the example of the Institut d'histoire du livre)or a collaboration with a research library (such as the Herzog August Bibliothek),and dreamt of the creation of a Flemish Heritage Library.At the end of the colloquium, Paul Hoftijzer, professor of book history in Leiden,

was asked to reflect on the theme of the conference and the presentations.5 LikeDelsaerdt before him, he also pointed out the lack of an institutional anchor as amajor sore point. He had positive things to say about the impressive libraries andarchives and the potential they had for the field. A potential that was seldom used toits full extent, even in the case of the world-renowned Museum Plantin-Moretus,recognised as a UNESCOWorld Heritage site. He advised Flemish researchers toconnect to the new international research topics, and in the organisation ofinternational conferences he saw a great potential for Flemish book historians tobreak out of their shell.In this essay, in many ways a follow-up to the colloquium of 2003, I will try to

look at what happened in the next decade. Did the twenty-first century initiate a ‘newbook history’ in Belgium? How did the field respond to the challenges researcherswere facing, as mentioned by Delsaerdt and Hoftijzer? Finally, I will address thechallenges Belgian book history is facing at the end of 2012.6

Figure 1. P. Delsaerdt, K. de Vlieger-de Wilde (eds.), Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen. Nieuweinstrumenten en benaderingen. Brussel 2004

5 P. Hoftijzer, ‘Slotbeschouwing’, in: Delsaerdt, De Vlieger-De Wilde, Boekgeschiedenis inVlaanderen, 103-108.

6 Belgium is a federal state with three communities: the Flemish Community, the FrenchCommunity and the German-speaking Community. Each community has its own scholaryresearch program. I have tried to include as much as possible the relevant book historicalresearch of each community, although it is only fair to say that this article focuses mainlyon research in Flanders.


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Stcv

The aim of the STCVwas to create an online retrospective bibliography of the printedbook in Flanders until 1800. Because of the enormous scope of the project, a phasedapproach was necessary. Originally the Max Wildiersfonds and the NederlandseTaalunie funded this project for four years (2000-2003).7 At the end of 2003, thedatabase was up and running and contained 3,700 editions (based on 7,000 copies)of Dutch-language books printed in Flanders in the seventeenth century from siximportant collections.8 Since 2004, the funding for the STCV has come from theFlemish Government. In September 2009, more than 11,000 editions were to befound in the database, the language criterion was dropped, and for specific collectionsthe temporal scope was widened to cover all printed books until 1800. Collectionsfrom other libraries were also included. After ten years of project funding, the STCVfinally found a harbour. It was incorporated in the newly created Flemish HeritageLibrary, a network organisation established by six heritage libraries in Flanders atthe end of 2008.9

The question remains whether this made the existence of the STCV less vulnerable.Indeed, the project is now part of a broader organisation and network, but the FlemishHeritage Library itself relies on funds from the government of Flanders that have tobe renewed every five years. Furthermore, the STCV is but one of the tasks of theFlemish Heritage Library, meaning it has to compete with other projects within theorganisation for the limited amount of money that can be spent.At the end of 2012, the STCV contained 30,000 copies, the majority of which are

to be found in ten collections. The STCV was in many ways the catalyst of therevitalisation of book historical research in Belgium. In its thirteen years of existencethe project has gained an international reputation and its modus operandi has becomethe best practise in the bibliographical description of hand press books. The STCVmanual Handleiding voor de Short Title Catalogus Vlaanderen has been distributedand followed in Flanders and beyond.10 In 2010 and 2011, the bibliographers of theSTCV also organised a workshop to teach librarians and scholars the tricks of thetrade. Many of the bibliographers working on the project later took on importantpositions in the field of book history.With its 30,000 checked copies, the STCV is an excellent research tool, not only

to find specific editions, but also for statistical analysis. So far, only a limited numberof researchers, almost all of them directly connected to the project, have used thedatabase as an important source (Steven Van Impe and Jan Bos, Diederik Lanoye,Goran Proot and

7 On the STCV project: S. Van Rossem [et al.], ‘The Short Title Catalogus Vlaanderen (STCV):The Bibliography of Seventeenth-Century Books in Flanders’, in:Quaerendo 33 (2003) 3-4,336-354. More info at: www.vlaamse-erfgoedbibliotheek.be.

8 STCV-Nieuwsbrief 1 (2004), [1].9 P. Delsaerdt, ‘Ons papieren geheugen en hoe het te onderhouden. De start van de Vlaamse

Erfgoedbibliotheek’, in: Ons erfdeel. Vlaams-Nederlands cultureel tijdschrift 53 (2010),24-37.

10 S. van Impe [et al.], Handleiding voor de Short Title Catalogus Vlaanderen. Antwerpen2005.


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myself).11 This is a pity because a more frequent use of this database in researchprojects could increase its visibility and stress its importance towards investors. Eventhough the STCV is now well-established, the database has always been running ona minimal budget. For the start-up period (2000-2003) two bibliographers wereassigned to the project. After that the staffing was brought back to one full-timebibliographer. Recently, this has been further reduced to 0,70 FTE, and due to thelimited budget the Flemish Heritage Library has to work with in the next years, thisall-time-low number of staff will most certainly be reduced evenmore. In comparison:at its peak (2003-2009) there were more than 20 bibliographers working for theShort-Title Catalogue Netherlands (STCN), and even today after the official closureof the STCN-project, two people for a total of 0,75 FTE are still ‘maintaining’ theSTCN. This means a finished bibliographical project in the Netherlands has moremanpower than a running bibliographical project in Flanders. The STCV tries tocircumvent this problem by training local librarians to become STCV bibliographers.This is necessary to maintain the scholary nature of bibliographical descriptions,based on the four-eyes principle. An advantage of this solution to the lack of staffingis that it increases awareness and bibliographical knowledge in local collections andstandardises the descriptive model in Flanders. On the other hand, because a newlytrained bibliographer can never reach the same level as an experienced one, it raisesquestions about the quality of the descriptions and overall makes the progress of thenational bibliography for Flanders very slow.

Publishing History

One of the fields where book history has made progress in the last few years ispublishing history. Current studies build on the groundbreakingworks of two foundingfathers: Leon Voet and Ludo Simons. For the ancien régime The Golden Compasses,written by Leon Voet, former director of the Plantin-Moretus Museum, gives adetailed overview of the activities and strategies of the Officina Plantiniana.12 Morethan forty years after its publication The Golden Compasses is still a quintessentialreference for editorial practices in the ancien régime, not only for the Southern

11 S. van Impe, J. Bos, ‘Romein en gotisch in zeventiende-eeuws drukwerk. Eenvoorbeeldonderzoek voor het gebruik van de STCN en STCV’ in: De zeventiende eeuw 22(2006) 2, 283-297; D. Lanoye, ‘De Mechelse drukpers voor 1800’, in: Jaarboek voorNederlandse boekgeschiedenis 16 (2009), 131-150; G. Proot, ‘Hoe volledig zijn de STCN ende STCV? Een bepaling van het werkelijk aantal boeken in folio, kwarto, octavo en duodecimouit de periode 1601-1640 gedrukt in Nederland en Vlaanderen aan de hand van overgeleverdeexemplaren’, in: E. Bloemsaat [et al.] (eds.), Janboel. Opstellen aangeboden aan Jan Bosbij de afronding van de Short-Title Catalogue, Netherlands. Den Haag 2009, 123-132; G.Proot, ‘De opmars van de romein: het gebruik van romein en gotisch in Nederlandstaligdrukwerk uit de zuidelijke Lage Landen, 1541-1700’, in: Jaarboek voor Nederlandseboekgeschiedenis 19 (2012), 66-85; S. Van Rossem, ‘En Amberes: de Verdussens en deboekhandel met de Iberische wereld’, in: W. Thomas, E. Stols (eds.), Een wereld op papier.Zuid-Nederlandse boeken, prenten en kaarten in het Spaanse en Portugese wereldrijk(16de-18de eeuw). Leuven 2009, 89-108.

12 L. Voet, The golden compasses. A history and evaluation of the printing and publishingactivities of the Oficina Plantiniana at Antwerp. 2 vols., Amsterdam 1969, 1972.


Netherlands, but for the whole of Europe. As one of the few Belgian monographs tobe written in English, on the


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most important publishing firm of the period and based on themost complete businessarchive of the whole ancien regime period, it is still the best known and most cited‘Belgian’ book-historical study.13

Contemporary research uses the work of Voet as a stepping stone and a mirror.On the one hand, it focuses on aspects of the history of the Officina Plantiniana notcovered by Voet, such as the successors of Plantin, the Moretus family. Dirk Imhofhas written on the Moretuses in the seventeenth century, e.g. in his dissertation onthe publication strategies of Joannes I Moretus, Plantin's successor.14 Together withKaren Bowen, he has studied the strategic use of intaglio printing to illustrate Plantinpress books.15

Recently, scholars have emphasised the need to step away from the paradigm ofPlantin and his successors. Even though the abundance of sources makes it impossiblenot to work on the Officina Plantiana, the need is felt to look at other printers andbooksellers in order to discover general publishing practices. The large scale andspecific output prohibit this firm from serving as a pars pro toto of the book trade inAntwerp, the Southern Netherlands or Europe. Based on the partially preservedbusiness archives of the Verdussen family, the second most important Antwerpdynasty, I have analysed their editorial strategies. My research focuses on differenceswith the Officina Plantiniana, regarding for instance collaboration practices betweenpublishers and the economic importance of popular prints in the publisher's list.16

Even though we still have many lacunae to fill concerning the Antwerp book trade,notably in the eighteenth century, the city has received a lot more attention than othertypographic centres in the Southern Netherlands. The increased attention devoted toother cities is therefore a useful development. After defending his thesis on the booktrade in the (post-)incunabula period Renaud Adam has started a project on the booktrade in Brussels in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.17 In 2009 a referencework was published on the book in the principauté de Liège by the Société desbibliophiles Liégeois with contributions from 37 authors.18A 2010 exhibition projectresulted in a fresh overview on the history of the book in Mechelen (Malines).19

The history of publishing houses in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is almostentirely monopolised by literary historians, contrary to the ancien régime periodwhere publishing history is mostly carried out by historians. With his Geschiedenis

13 Leon Voet is the only Belgian scholar to be included as a lemma in Michael F. Suarez, H.R.Woudhuysen, The Oxford companion to the book. 2 vols., Oxford 2010.

14 D. Imhof De Officina Plantiniana ratione recta: Jan I Moretus als uitgever te Antwerpen1589-161. PhD dissertation, Universiteit Antwerpen 2008.

15 K. Bowen, D. Imhof,Christopher Plantin and engraved book illustrations in sixteenth-centuryEurope. Cambridge 2008.

16 S. Van Rossem, ‘The struggle for domination of the almanac market: Antwerp, 1626-1642’,in: Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 106 (2012) 1, 63-98; S. Van Rossem,‘In compagnie! Samenwerkingsverbanden rond de familie Verdussen in de zeventiendeeeuw’, in: S. Van Rossem, M. De Wilde (eds.), Boekgeschiedenis in het kwadraat: context,casus. Brussel 2006, 79-96.

17 R. Adam, Imprimeurs et société dans les Pays-Bas méridionaux et en Principauté de Liège(1473-ca 1520). PhD dissertation, Université de Liège 2011.

18 P. Bruyère, A. Marchandisse (eds.), Florilège du livre en Principauté de Liège du IXe auXVIIIe siècle. Liège 2009.

19 D. Lanoye [et al.] (eds.), Gedrukte stad. Drukken in en voor Mechelen, 1581-1800. Brugge2010.


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van de uitgeverij in Vlaanderen Ludo Simons wrote a groundbreaking studyuncovering the history of the publishing industry in Flanders, a history that is stronglylinked to the emerging cultural identity of Flanders (Vlaamse Beweging/the Flemishmovement), to the ideological pillars such as catholicism and socialism, dividingsocial and cultural life in Flanders until the end of the twentieth century and last butnot least the ambiguous relationship with the Netherlands.20 In 2013, a revised editionof this magnum opus will appear, incorporating the latest studies. Furthermore, thefocus will shift from the publishing houses to the role of the book in Flanders, therebyproducing an alternative cultural history of Flanders.A new generation of literary historians such as Kevin Absillis and Jan Pauwels

will certainly be included in this new edition. Pauwels has written on the post-mortemeditions of the work of Hendrik Conscience, Flanders' best-known author of thenineteenth century, by the Amsterdam publisher Lambertus Jacobus Veen,emphasising the important role of the publisher in the creation of Conscience as acanonized author.21 Kevin Absillis wrote his doctoral dissertation on the publishinghouse of Angèle Manteau, using the history of this unique firm almost as a metaphorfor the introduction of modernism in Flanders.22

Poorly studied periods have recently been researched, such as the period of theVerenigd Koninkrijk der Nederlanden (United Kingdom of the Netherlands,1815-1830), when both the Northern and Southern Netherlands were reunited underkingWillem I.23 In her dissertation on the political role of literature during this period,Janneke Weijermars also focused on the different publishing houses involved. Infrancophone BelgiumMichel-Benoît Fincoeur carried out research into francophonepublishing during the Second World War that resulted in a PhD in 2006.24

Literary Studies

The possibilities of book historical methodologies in literary studies have been clearlydemonstrated since the 1970s and 1980s by the works of Werner Waterschoot, PietVerkruijsse and Hubert Meeus, all of whom stressed the importance of materialityin the study of literary texts.25 Fairly few scholars have picked up on this to incorporateanalytical bibliography into their methodology. An exception is the dissertation of

20 L. Simons, Geschiedenis van de uitgeverij in Vlaanderen. 2 vols., Tielt 1984, 1987.21 J. Pauwels, ‘Méér dan een mode-koorts’: Guido Gezelle en zijn postume uitgever Lambertus

Jacobus Veen, 1901-1919. Leuven 2005.22 K. Absillis, Vechten tegen de bierkaai. Over het uitgevershuis van Angèle Manteau

(1932-1970). Antwerpen/Amsterdam 2009.23 J. Weijermars, Stiefbroeders. Zuid-Nederlandse letteren en natievorming onder Willem I,

1814-1834. Hilversum 2012.24 M.-B. Fincoeur, L'histoire de l'édition francophone belge sous l'Occupation allemande

(1940-1944). PhD dissertation, Université libre de Bruxelles 2006.25 W. Waterschoot, De ‘Poeticsche werken’ van Jonker van der Noot. Analytische bibliografie

en tekstuitgave met inleiding en verklarende aantekeningen. 3 vols., Gent 1975; P.J.Verkruijsse,Mattheus Smallegange (1624-1710). Zeeuws historicus, genealoog en vertaler.Descriptieve persoonsbibliografie. Met een verantwoording van de gevolgde methode vanpartiële interne collatie. Nieuwkoop 1983; H. Meeus, Zacharias Heyns: uitgever en


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Maartje De Wilde on vernacular secular song books in the seventeenth century.26

This work draws heavily on thematerial description of the printed sources and focusesless on a purely literary analysis of the text, in order to answer importantbook-historical questions about the materiality, distribution and reception of thesebooks.

Figure 2. K. Absillis, Vechten tegen de bierkaai. Over het uitgeverskuis van Angèle Manteau(1932-1970). Amsterdam/Antwerpen 2009

Goran Proot left the official literary canon as well to work on theatre programmesfor plays organised by the Jesuits in the provincia Flandro-Belgica.27 Analyticalbibliography is an important part of this methodology as he meticulously describesformats, sizes, and typography, as well as the print runs and printing costs of thetheatre programs. A fundamental result of this research is the development of amathematical model which makes it possible to estimate loss rates in large corporaof editions.28

toneelauteur. Bio-bibliografie met een uitgave en analyse van de Vriendts-Spieghel. 3 vols.,PhD dissertation, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven 1990.

26 M. De Wilde, De lokroep van de nachtegaal. Wereldlijke liedboeken uit de ZuidelijkeNederlanden (1628-1677). PhD dissertation, Universiteit Antwerpen 2011.

27 G. Proot, Het schooltoneel van de jezuïeten in de Provincia Flandro-Belgica tijdens hetancien régime (1575-1773). PhD dissertation, Universiteit Antwerpen 2008.

28 G. Proot, L. Egghe, ‘Estimating editions on the basis of survivals: printed programmes ofJesuit plays in theProvincia Flandro-Belgica before 1773, with a note on the “BookHistoricalLaw”’, in: Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 102 (2008) 2, 149-174.


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Consumption

The reception or consumption of books has been only sparsely studied in a Belgiancontext. Book historians have focused mainly on libraries and the collection habitsof scholars and the upper social classes. Pierre Delsaerdt's dissertation (published in2001) combined research of the Leuven book trade with an analysis of the bookcollections of the professors at the University of Leuven.29 Bart op de Beeck workedon the liquidation of the Jesuit libraries in the Low Countries.30 Lastly, Chris Coppenshas been researching sixteenth-century sales catalogues in a European perspective.31

South of the language border, Céline van Hoorebeeck focuses on the history oflibraries in the late Middle Ages and Claude Sorgeloos has written numerous articlesand books on private and library collections in the early modern period.32 So far, thenewest research questions, focusing on individual reading habits33 and based onego-documents, often collected in large databases such as the Reading ExperienceDatabase, have not really materialised in Belgium.34

Books and globalisation

Since 2008, professor Werner Thomas of the University of Leuven has started aseries of research projects on the role of the printing press in the Southern Netherlandsin the creation of the Spanish colonial empire. Under the title ‘The infrastructure ofglobalisation’, several scholars are working on different regions of the SpanishEmpire: New Spain, New Granada and Rio de la Plata, and Peru.35 All projects buildon Serge Gruzinsky's thesis of the role of the printing press in mondialisation or thecreation of one big intellectual space, and in the creation of a ‘paper infrastructure’

29 P. Delsaerdt, Suam quisque bibliothecam. Boekhandel en particulier boekenbezit aan deoude Leuvense universiteit, 16de-18de eeuw. Leuven 2001.

30 B. op de Beeck, Jezuïetenbibliotheken in de Zuidelijke Nederlanden. De liquidatie 1773-1828.PhD dissertation, University of Leuven 2008.

31 C. Coppens, ‘A census of printers', booksellers' catalogues up to 1600: some provisionalconclusions’, in: Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America 102 (2008) 4, 557-565.

32 Some examples: C. Sorgeloos, ‘Pérennité ou dispersion: bibliothèques privées en Hainaut’,in: Le livre et l'estampe 56 (2010), 157-189; M.-T. Isaac, C. Sorgeloos, L'école centrale dudépartement de Jemappes, 1797-1802. Enseignement, livres et Lumières à Mons. Brussels2004.

33 J. Blaak, Dagelijks lezen en schrijven in de vroegmoderne tijd in Nederland 1624-1770.Hilversum 2004; A. Baggerman, R. Dekker, Child of the Enlightenment. RevolutionaryEurope reflected in a boyhood diary. Leiden 2009.

34 Reading Experience Database: www.open.ac.uk/Arts/RED.35 C.Manrique, ‘FromAntwerp to Veracruz. Looking for books from the Southern Netherlands

inMexican colonial libraries’, in:De gulden passer 87 (2009), 93-109; C.Manrique,Culturaltrade between the Southern Netherlands and New Spain. Phd Dissertation, University ofLeuven 2013; U. Fuss, ‘From Antwerp to Peru. Books from the Southern Netherlands in thesixteenth-century's Viceroyalty’, in: Jaarboek voor Nederlandse Boekgeschiedenis 18 (2011),115-132.


at the service of the Spanish monarchy.36 The uniqueness of this new research topiclies in the fact that

36 S. Gruzinski, ‘Les mondes mêlés de laMonarchie catholique et autres “connected histories”’,in: Annales. Histoire, sciences sociales 56 (2001) 1, 85-117; S. Gruzinski, Les quatre partiesdu monde. Histoire d'une mondalisation. Paris 2004.


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it combines book-historical methodologies on authorship and translation, commercialnetworks and distribution, and reception with the more general history of mentalities.It sheds light on the international position of the Southern Netherlands after theseparation from the Northern Netherlands, and successfully categorises the SouthernNetherlands as a cultural hub within the Spanish Empire.

Typography

For decades, typographic research in Belgium has been the area of Hendrik D.L.Vervliet, one of the most renowned scholars in this field worldwide.37 Even well afterhis retirement, he continues to publish in large numbers, although the focus of hislatest research lies primarily on non-Belgian topics, such as French Renaissanceprinting types.38

From 2009 to 2012, the post-doctoral research project of Goran Proot aimed toshed light on the typographical evolutions of the hand press book in Flanders. Inorder to attain this end, he analysed the typography of a limited number of well-chosengenres. The leading hypothesis of this project is that typographical evolutions developdifferently, faster or slower, depending on the characteristics of the distinguishedgenres.39 The work of Alexandre Vanautgaerden also deserves attention. In 2008 heco-edited La page de titre à la Renaissance with Jean-François Gilmont, containingthirteen studies on title page design.40 In 2012 he published his dissertation on theactive role of Desiderius Erasmus in the design and publication of his works.41

Societies and journals

Belgium has two book historical societies and four bibliophile societies. The bookhistorical societies are divided by the language border: there is the VlaamseWerkgroep Boekgeschiedenis (Flanders BookHistorical Society) and the francophoneGroupe de contact: Documents rares et précieux. The bibliophile societies areconnected to cities: Mons (Société des Bibliophiles deMons/Société des BibliophilesBelges séant à Mons), Antwerp (Vereniging van Antwerpse Bibliofielen), Brussels

37 In 2011 Hendrik D.L. Vervliet received the American Printing History Association Awardfor Distinguished Achievement.

38 H. Vervliet, The palaeotypography of the French Renaissance. Selected papers onsixteenth-century typefaces. 2 vols., Leiden 2008; id., French Renaissance printing types. Aconspectus. Delaware/London 2010; id., Vine leaf ornaments in Renaissance typography. Asurvey. New Castle/Houten 2012.

39 G. Proot, ‘Designing theWord of God. Layout and typography of Flemish 16th-century foliobibles published in the vernacular’, in: De gulden passer 90 (2012) 2, 143-179.

40 J.-F. Gilmont, A. Vanautgaerden (eds.), La page de titre à la Renaissance. Treize étudessuivies de cinquante-quatre pages de titre commentées et d'un lexique des termes relatifs àla page de titre. Turnhout/Anderlecht 2008.

41 A. Vanautgaerden, Erasme typographe. Humanisme et imprimerie au début du XVIe siècle.Genève 2012.


(Koninklijke Vereniging van Bibliofielen en Iconofielen van België) and Liège(Société des Bibliophiles liégeois). I will briefly go into themost important evolutions.


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The Flanders Book Historical Society (VWB) was founded in 1996 and has increasedits activities and membership over the years. The board grew from two to sevenmembers and the membership went from 40 in 1996 to 62 in 2012. Originally, themembers of the Flanders Book Historical Society met once or twice a year. In 2003,the Society started to organise conferences and colloquia for non-members as well.Over the last decade, a book historical colloquium has been organised almost everyyear, often in collaboration with other organisations such as the Groupe de contactor the Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging.42 Furthermore the VWB started a newinitiative in 2009, the Miraeus lectures. This series, organised in collaboration withthe City of Antwerp and the Vereniging van Antwerpse Bibliofielen, aimed atpromoting scholary exchange between Flanders and the rest of the world. This provedto be a successful formula: as of the end of 2012, seventeen prominent speakers havespoken in the Nottebohmzaal and the Miraeus Lectures are a well-established name.The international position of book history in Flanders will reach a peak in 2014,when the VWB will host the Annual Conference of the Society for the History ofAuthorship, Reading and Publishing (SHARP) in Antwerp on the theme ‘Religionsof the book’.The two main book historical journals in Belgium are issued by bibliophile

societies: Le livre et l'éstampe by the Koninklijke Vereniging van Bibliofielen enIconofielen van België and De Gulden Passer by the Vereniging van AntwerpseBibliofielen. The latter journal in particular underwent a facelift in recent years.Originally established as the yearbook of the Vereniging van Antwerpse Bibliofielenin 1923, it widened its scope in 2009. First, it changed its format from a yearbookto a scientific journal by introducing peer review and by appearing twice a year, andsecond, it changed its subtitle to Journal for Book History, this way officially servingas a journal for a scholary field, rather than being the medium of a society. Led bya rejuvenated board, De Gulden Passer has attracted a lot of new scholars fromBelgium and abroad.

Rewind to 2003: Results and challenges

Looking back at 2003, how many of the challenges described by Delsaerdt andHoftijzer have been addressed, or better, how far have the goals of these twoprofessors of book history been realised ten years later? On the positive side, theinternational orientation of book history in Belgium has increased dramatically. New

42 2003: Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen: nieuwe instrumenten en benaderingen (together withSTCV); 2004: Abdijbibliotheken: heden, verleden en toekomst (together with the Province ofAntwerp); 2005: Boekgeschiedenis in het kwadraat: context en casus; 2008: Geschiedenisvan het particulier boekenbezit in België, 1750-1850 (together with Koninklijke Bibliotheekvan België); 2009:Urban networks and the printing trade in EarlyModern Europe (15th-18thcentury) (together with Koninklijke Bibliotheek van België andGroupe de contact Documentsrares et précieux); 2010: Aanstormend en gevestigd: Boekonderzoek in de Lage Landen(together with Nederlandse Boekhistorische Vereniging); 2010: The letter of the law:regulation and censorship of the book trade in Early Modern Europe (together withMuseumPlantin-Moretus); 2011: Book design from the Middle Ages to the future; 2012: Hetgeïllustreerde boek in België 1800-1865 (together with Koninklijke Bibliotheek België andGroupe de contact Documents rares et précieux).


research topics, such as the economics of publishing, the form-content relationship,and a transnational approach, are now aligned with current international scholarship.On an institutional level, book


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history in Belgium has widened its scope with internationally-oriented journals,lecture programmes and conferences.Nevertheless, there are still a number of challenges to be faced. In academic

research, Belgium is still running behind on recent developments in the study ofreading practices. The progress of successful projects such as the Short-Title CatalogueFlanders has slowed down as funds are diminishing long before the finish line iseven in sight. New media, such as the internet, audiobooks and the e-book, are notstudied in Belgium from a book-historical angle. Generally speaking, the field needsan allembracing research program aimed at locating and consequently filling in thescholary blind spots. Institutionally, book historical and bibliophile societies inBelgium and the Netherlands have started work together occasionally, but there isstill a lot of room for improvement. It might also be necessary to critically analysethe landscape of the different organisations and journals in order to avoid overlap.We should not be afraid to integrate existing societies if this creates interestingsynergies. Furthermore, a clear demarcation of the scope and position of the differentbook historical journals in Belgium and the Netherlands is necessary to prevent anoverkill of similar journals that will eventually lead to a lack of quality.Apart from these minor remarks, there is one big gaping hole in the expressway.

Book history in Belgium is still an academic vagrant. Until now, most academicwork has not been realised in universities, but in libraries. Librarians such as D.H.L.Vervliet, Pierre Delsaerdt, Leon Voet, Elly Cockx-Indestege, Chris Coppens andLudo Simons are highly respected and are considered among the most importantresearchers in the field in- and outside Belgium. But by working as librarians, theyhave not had to incorporate their work in university programs, motivate their researchin front of scholary committees or publish their results in peer-reviewed journals.Book history has been able to flourish in its own small garden, but this independentstatus has also made it vulnerable and dependent on the few and shrinking numberof part-time researchers, especially since the profile of the librarian-scholar seemsto disappear from the library staffs to be replaced by the librarian-manager.In 2003, Delsaerdt and Hoftijzer stressed the institutional embedding of the field

in a university program or research library as the most important challenge. Ten yearslater some things have changed, but not for the better. Indeed, a Flemish HeritageLibrary has arrived, but it is strictly organised as a network between libraries withcollections of rare books and operates in no way as a scholary benefactor (e.g. byoffering research travel grants or scholarships). Furthermore, no Belgian universityoffers a book history programme. Needless to say, Antwerp would be the perfectspot for such a programme. Many of the scholars in the history and literaturedepartments work in the field, the city houses unique collections and archives(Museum Plantin-Moretus to name but one), and many editorial houses are locatedthere. If we fail to give book history an academic institutional harbour, a lot of whathas been built over the last years may collapse; the rich tradition of more than 50years is threatened because it solely depends on the activities of individuals, howevertalented and motivated they might be.


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Rikard WingårdSwedish book historical research 2006-2012A survey

In an article published seven years ago, Per S. Ridderstad sketched a map of Swedishresearch in book history between the years 1990 and 2005.1 Although Ridderstadlamented the fact that book history had difficulties in gaining ground as aninstitutionalised academic discipline, it was obvious from his outline that book historyas a research field was thriving and was supported by scholars in most Swedishuniversities. The purpose of the present article is to continue where Ridderstad leftoff, and provide an updated survey of the developments in Swedish book history inthe past years.2 I will use the latter term to designate book historical studies writtenin Swedish or about Swedish culture and society, whether produced within Swedenor abroad.Book history has continued to gain interest, and it would be impossible to cover

all areas and publications that fall within the scope of such a multidisciplinary andfar reaching subject. They can be found in anything from university dissertations todesign magazines and the yearbook of the local folk museum. I have generally triedto focus on the activities of the larger academic institutions, and to mentionpublications with scholarly ambitions. Rather than to give an extensive list of worksor to restrict myself to the most groundbreaking research within the field, I haveaimed to give a general blueprint of the different kinds of scholarship currentlypracticed. I am not a specialist in every subject covered, and I have usually refrainedfrommaking any critical comments, although I have, according to the space permitted,tried to say something substantial of most of the contributions presented. For practicalreasons, articles and anthologies have, with a few exceptions, been left out - althoughmany important results have been published in these forms as well. The selection ispersonal, but - I sincerely hope - not exclusive. To anyone who finds themselveswrongly treated I offer my apologies.

1 P.S. Ridderstad, ‘Swedish book history research 1990-2005’, in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok-och bibliotekshistoria 86 (2002) 2, 317-332. Other recent surveys, with differing points ofview, have been made by W. Undorf, ‘Inkunabler och inkunabelforskning i Sverige. Enaktuell översikt’, in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria (2006), 117-141; M.Gram, ‘Bokhistoria som forskningsfält. Var står vi och vart går vi?’, in: Biblis 45 (2009),32-38; W. Undorf, ‘Research in Scandinavian 15th-18th century book and library history1950-2008’, in: F. Barbier, I. Monok (eds.),Cinquante ans d'histoire du livre: de l'Apparitiondu Livre (1958) à 2008. Bilan et projets. Budapest 2009, 127-150.

2 I would like to thank Mats Dahlström for his helpful comments on the article and HelenaStrömquist Dal for kindly providing some of the illustrations.


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The outline begins with a view of the institutional and infrastructural support bookhistory has in Sweden. It then proceeds to consider publications within the field, anddoes so in a chronological manner as to the subject of the studies, i.e. it starts withresearch concerning the manuscript period, followed by the hand press period, andthe machine press period of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A section on acouple of methodological studies follows. I close with a concluding discussion anda gaze forward.

Organisation of book historical research in Sweden

For most of the twentieth century book historical research was mainly conducted bydedicated librarians at the university libraries, by some scholars in traditionaldepartments, such as literary studies, history of ideas and art history, as well as byindependent researchers such as private book collectors, publishers, printers etcetera.In 1965 book history was in some sense established as a university discipline throughthe foundation of Avdelningen för litteratursociologi (the section for sociology ofliterature) at the Department of literature of the University of Uppsala, but it was notuntil Einar Hansen donated a chair in book and library history to the University ofLund in 1987 that a specialised institution was formed: Avdelningen för ABM ochbokhistoria (the section of ALM3 and book history).4 It is still the only one of its kind,although the departments of library and information science across the country5 aswell as occasional endeavours by the larger university libraries are in part dedicatedto the same goals. In addition, however, a professional initiative was taken as earlyas 1974 by Rolf E. DuRietz, who privately founded the Center for BibliographicalStudies in Uppsala. The center's staff consists of DuRietz and his wife, Gun-BrittDuRietz, and has since its inception published works in bibliography and textualscholarship, and edited the bilingual journal Text. Svensk tidskrift för bibliografi(Text. Swedish journal of bibliography).6 Their largest undertaking is the openendedSwedish imprints 1731-1833. A retrospective national bibliography (SWIM).Publication started in 1977 and is still continuing - the latest volumes were issued in2011.Regarding textual scholarship and critical editions the driving force is Svenska

vitterhetssamfundet (Swedish association of belles-lettres). Since 1907, the associationhas promoted the publication of scholarly editions of the works of Swedish authorsand arranged conferences on current textual and bibliographical concerns.7 As topre-Reformation works, Svenska fornskriftssällskapet (Swedish society of old texts),founded in 1843, serves the same function as Svenska vitterhetsamfundet, and otherlarger editorial projects are going on as well. The publication of the 72nd volume ofthe ‘national edi-

3 Abbrevation for Archives, Libraries, and Museums.4 The first professor to be appointed, in 1991, was the aforementioned Per S. Ridderstad Henrik

Horstbøll succeeded him in 2009.5 Especially at the Swedish School of Library and Information Science at the University of

Borås.6 The journal is published at irregular intervals. Many articles are in English.7 For further information see the association's homepage: www.svenskavitterhetssamfundet.se.


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tion’ of August Strindberg's collected works, for instance, is scheduled for 2013. Itis estimated that the edition will be completed within three and a half years.8

To improve national and international cooperation a number of forums andnetworks have been formed during the years. Nordiskt näerk för editionsfilologer(Nordic network for textual critics) was founded in 1995 and acts to strengthen theposition of textual scholarship within the academy through newsletters, conferences,publications, and graduate education.9Another interscandinavian network is Nordisktforum för bokhistoria (Nordic forum for book history), which is a joint collaborationbetween the book history department in Lund and the research group for textualscholarship at University of Copenhagen. The forum comprises approximately 200members and frequently hosts seminars and mini-conferences on various topics.10

The Nordic-Baltic-Russian Network on the History of Books, Libraries and Reading(HIBOLIRE) is a similar network that encourages research and education in its fieldand across national borders. They play an active role in realising projects, conferences,and publications.11

Naturally, on an infrastructural level digitisation and database projects of differentkinds are also flourishing. Especially worth mentioning is ProBok, a database ofbookbindings and provenances from the hand press period.12 It records informationon bookbinding techniques in individual copies, the materials used and thedecorations, and the history of ownership.While Swedish and Scandinavian book historical research has expanded its presence

on the Internet it has unfortunately diminished in printed communication channels.A significant drawback was the discontinuation of Nordisk tidskrift för bok- ochbibliotekshistoria (originally published as Nordisk tidskrift för bok- ochbiblioteksväsen). The journal had been themajor voice of Scandinavian book historicalscholarship since its foundation in 1914. In 2006 the last issue was published, whenthe funding partners, the five Scandinavian national libraries, decided not to supportthe journal any longer.13 Up to 1997 Sweden had two other printed forums for bookhistory, on the one hand the journal Bokvännen, issued by Sällskapet bokvännerna,and on the other the yearbook Biblis, issued by Föreningen för bokhantverk. In thatyear, however, the two societies merged, Bokvännen disappeared and Biblis wastransformed into a quarterly journal. Next to Text, published by DuRietz, Biblis isat present the only Swedish journal solely dedicated to book history and related fields.Of course occasional book historical contributions can be found in other journals

as well, such as those on history of ideas or literature. In the last years there hasactually

8 On the society see: svenskafornskriftsallskapet.se. On Strindberg see: www.strind.su.se.9 See the network's homepage: www.nnedit.org. In the last seven years three publications from

previous conferences have been issued by the network: O.E. Haugen [et al.] (eds.), Filologiog hermeneutikk. Oslo 2007; M. Malm [et al.] (eds.), Bokens materialitet. Bokhistoria ochbibliografi. Stockholm 2009; P. Forssell, C. Herberts, Digitala och tryckta utgåvor.Erfarenheter, planering och teknik i förändring. Helsingfors 2011.

10 See the forum's homepage, where papers from forum seminars can also be found:nffb.wordpress.com.

11 See the network's homepage: www.helsinki.fi/historia/hibolire.12 See: probok.alvin-portal.org and www.probok.se.13 E. Eide [et al.], ‘Forord’, in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria (2006), 5.


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Figure 1. ProBok 608, example of binding and provenance from the ProBok database. Vellum bindingwith stamped inititals P[etr] W[ok] Z R[ožmberka]W[ok] D[e] R[osis] 1606. Photo: Lund UniversityLibrary, Bengt Melliander


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been an upsurge in thematic issues on book history, a reassuring sign of the statusof and growing interest in the field.14

Manuscript period

As Ridderstad noted in his 2005 article, most Swedish manuscript research wasconcerned with Vadstena abbey and its remaining collections, to a large extentpreserved in the so called C-collection in Uppsala university library. This has notchanged. The well-funded project The production of texts and manuscripts in theVadstena monastery. Production, tradition and reception has, for instance, yieldedseveral interesting studies. In her dissertation on the production of prayer books,Ingela Bolton-Hedström showed, amongst other things, that book production wascarefully planned in advance, and that reading and writing skills in the sisters' conventwere much better than has previously been assumed.15 Jonas Carlquist enhanced thisview in a number of studies, and also demonstrated how different books were used,for instance in table reading at meal times.16Nils Dverstorp took another perspective,evaluating and refining paleographic methodology for identifying scribes, datingmanuscripts, and investigating manuscript production. Dverstorp also dismisses theearlier view of the so-called Vadstena script (or Vadstena cursive or style) as asignificantly different script from other European scripts used at the time.17

These and other studies within the larger project were summarised, synthesisedand further developed in a conference, the papers of which have been published.18

Under the manuscript heading I would also like to mention a work byMats Malm,that starts off in the manuscript era - or more correctly, the era of runic stoneinscription - and then gradually progresses into the nineteenth century. In a series ofessays Malm discusses the ‘voices’ that have been and can still be heard in differenthistorical texts depending on the mode of reading, the material carriers, and thetypographical forms of the texts.19

Hand press period

During the last years a number of academic publications are to be noted that dealwith early modern book historical topics. It is, for instance, satisfying that incunabula

14 E.g. Lychnos. Årsbok för idé och lärdomshistoria (2010); LIR.journal, 1 (2011); Scandinavica.An international journal of Scandinavian studies 51 (2012) 2.

15 I. Hedström,Medeltidens svenska bönböcker. Kvinnligt skriftbruk i Vadstena kloster. Oslo2009.

16 E.g.: J. Carlquist, Vadstenasystrarnas textvärld Studier i systrarnas skriftbrukskompetens,lärdom och texförståelse. Uppsala 2007.

17 N. Dverstorp, Skrivaren och skriften. Om skrift- och handskriftsproduktion i Vadstena kloster.Oslo 2010.

18 C. Gejrot [et al.] (eds.), Saint Birgitta, Syon and Vadstena. Papers from a symposium inStockholm 4-6 October 2007. Stockholm 2010.

19 M. Malm, Poesins röster. Avlyssningar av äldre litteratur. Stockholm 2011.


studies once more have been brought to life in Sweden. A century after the goldenage of the


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internationally famous incunabulist Isak Collijn, Wolfgang Undorf defended histhesis, From Gutenberg to Luther. Transnational print cultures in Scandinavia1450-1525. As the title suggests, Undorf focuses on the Nordic countries in relationto their European neighbors. Whereas the previous purely national research hasregarded Scandinavia as a peripheral society, occasionally blessed with intellectuallight from the continent, Undorf shows how the early book culture of Sweden andDenmark reveals much of the same patterns as that of other European countries atthe same time, particularly England. At the end of the fifteenth century, Scandinaviawas part of a larger integrated cultural environment and, although not heavilypopulated by printers and publishers, showed a high degree of book ownership anda developed book trade.20

Figure 2. Rune types cut by Johannes Bureus (1568-1652), from his RVNA ABC Boken, Stockholm1611. Photo: Kungliga biblioteket, Stockholm

Another scholar that has occupied himself with early Swedish book culture is OtfriedCzaika. Czaika has primarily concentrated on the Reformation period and publishedon book-ownership and reading. One example is his treatise on Elisabet, daughterof King Gustav Vasa, and her library.21On an individual level Czaika thus supplementsUndorf's study, as he demonstrates Elisabet Vasa's reading as incorporated in a largerintellectual European context, although, naturally, with a protestant preponderance.

20 W. Undorf, From Gutenberg to Luther. Transnational print cultures in Scandinavia1450-1525. Berlin 2012. Available on the internet atedoc.hu-berlin.de/dissertationen/undorf-wolfgang-2012-01-05/PDF/undorf.pdf.

21 O. Czaika, Elisabet Vasa. En kvinna på 1500-talet och hennes böcker. Stockholm 2009.


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The earliest period of print culture is also the topic of Thomas Götselius' dissertationin literature. It is international in its scope and inspired by the theories of Foucault,Kittler, and Lacan. Götselius examines ‘how reading first became a practice ofindividualisation’ through, primarily, the discourse networks of northern humanism,i.e. how Erasmus, Luther and others used (or were used by) the print media to changethe notion of literature into a subject transforming device.22

Furthermore, in my own work I have taken an interest in early modern readingpractices. In my dissertation I discuss seventeenth-century Swedish and DanishVolksbücher as indicators of pre-modern forms of reading. By studying contextualmaterial as well as intrinsic features of the Volksbücher, e.g. paratextual andtypographical peculiarities, I develop two ideal types of readers, the assimilative andthe expansive reader, who are at odds with each other during the period, and of whomonly the latter prevails into the modern age.23

Scandinavian Volksbücher are the subject of yet another thesis. Anna KatharinaRichter studies their ability to transform (in content, stylistics, and bibliographicalappearance) and adapt to differing historical circumstances. She offers a fine exampleof the recent developments in the field of transmission and migration history.24

Two dissertations in library history are to be noted. The first, by Bertil Jansson,traces the development of the librarian's profession, 1475-1780. Jansson studies anumber of documents from various parts of Europe that describe and definelibrarianship. He shows how the librarian changes from being a person who routinelykept order among books to a profession in its own right, with its own set of ethicalvalues.25

The second thesis concerns the manuscript collection Codices Reginenses Latiniof Queen Christina of Sweden, kept in the Vatican library. Eva Nilsson Nylanderexamines the origin, order and subsequent development of the collection in what shecalls, paraphrasing D.F. McKenzie, a sociology of collections. The formation of thecollection is, for instance, seen as a conscious strategy of ‘branding’ Christina as anintellectual empress, and the different classification systems of the time are put intoa larger epistemological perspective.26

Changing to another branch of manuscript studies, Annie Mattsson has presenteda dissertation influenced by Harold Love's concept of scribal publishing. It dealswith libels against King Gustaf III, circulated in manuscripts 1772-1792, and analysesthem as to their distribution, rhetoric and ideas.27

22 T. Götselius, Själens medium. Skrift och subjekt i Nordeuropa omkring 1500. Göteborg 2010,311.

23 R. Wingård, Att sluta från början. Tidigmodern läsning och folkbokens receptionsestetik.Bokenäset 2011.

24 A.K. Richter, Transmissionsgeschichten. Untersuchungen zur dänischen und schwedischenErzählprosa in der frühen Neuzeit. Tübingen/Basel 2009; see also J. Glauser, A.K. Richter(eds.), Text - Reihe - Transmission. Unfestigkeit als Phänomen skandinavischer Erzählprosa1500-1800. Tübingen 2012.

25 B. Jansson, Bibliotekarien. Om yrkets tidiga innehåll och utveckling. Borås 2010.26 E. Nilsson Nylander, The mild boredom of order. A study in the history of the manuscript

collection of queen Christina of Sweden. Lund 2011.27 A.Mattsson,Komediant och riksförrädare. Handskriftscirkulerade smädeskrifter mot Gustaf

III. Uppsala 2010.


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Little attention has so far been given to individual printing presses in Sweden duringthe early modern period, but two recent dissertations have been published thatameliorate the situation somewhat. Using Bourdieu's social theories Lea Niskaneninvestigates the Frenckell press in Åbo and its accumulation of symbolic capital toconsolidate the firm. Suitable typography, marriage, and location of the press weresome of the ways to achieve this.28

Anna-Maria Rimm, on her part, examines the successful career of the femaleprinter, publisher, and bookseller, Elsa Fougt. Rimm highlights, for instance, theimportance of the household as the base of early modern firms. When her husbanddied, it enabled Fougt to take his place and compete on equal terms on the market,in spite of living in a very patriarchal society.29

The perspective of eighteenth-century women in cultural society has been adoptedbyMargareta Björkman as well. Her comprehensive biography of Catharina Ahlgren(1734-c. 1800), one of the first female journalists in Sweden, is revealing in manyareas of the period's book history. Ahlgren ran her own magazine, translated novelsand, among other things, published an account of her own reading of the novel Lafemme malheureuse ou Histoire d'Elise Windham. The account is very valuable inrecovering past reading experiences, and Björkman finds a high degree ofidentificatory reading in Ahlgren.30

Machine press period

In 2005 Ridderstad could not present much research concerning bookbinding.31 Hewas, however, awaiting Helena Strömberg's doctoral thesis, which was finallypublished in 2010. Strömberg places her sociological study in the intermediate stagebetween hand press and mechanised book production, describing the importance ofcommercial paper bindings in the development of the modern book market. Cheapand flexible, the paper binding managed to increase sales without devaluating thebook as a commodity. In addition Strömberg conducts a bibliographical analysis ofpaper binding techniques and develops a terminology for describing paper wrappers.32

Apart from Strömberg's, another dissertation in book binding history was publishedrecently: Kristina Lundblad investigated the further development and importance ofmanufactured bindings during the nineteenth century in relationship to a modernisingbook market and society. Amongst other things, Lundblad discusses in an interesting

28 L. Niskanen, Boktryckarna i Åbo 1750-1828. En bokhistorisk studie genom ett yrke. Lund2010.

29 A-M. Rimm, Elsa Fougt, Kungl. boktryckare. Aktör i det litterära systemet ca 1780-1810.Uppsala 2009.

30 M. Björkman,Catharina Ahlgren. Ett skrivande fruntimmer i 1700-talets Sverige. Stockholm2006.

31 Although not within his definition of Swedish research he might have mentioned StaffanFogelmark's groundbreaking Flemish and related panel-stamped bindings. New York 1990.

32 H. Strömberg, ‘Med coleurt omslag’. Färgade, dekorerade och tryckta pappersomslag påsvensk bokmarknad, 1787-1846. Lund 2010.


way how the pictorial content of the bindings reflects and amplifies larger culturaltrends.33

33 K. Lundblad, Om betydelsen av böckers utseende. Det svenska förlagsbandets framväxt ochetablering under perioden 1840-1914 med särskild hänsyn till dekorerade klotband. Enstudie av bokbandens formgivning, teknik och relation till frågor ommodernitet och materiellkultur. Malmö 2010.


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Figure 3. Paper bindings with publisher's printed spine titles and labels, ca 1800. FromH. Strömquist,‘Med coleurt omslag’. Fargarde, dekoredade och tryckta pappersomslag på svensk bokmarknad,1787-1846. Lund 2010. Photo: Helena Strömquist

From another perspective the Swedish book trade in the nineteenth century hasbeen studied by Gunnel Furuland. In her dissertation serialised fiction from fourcompeting publishing houses is discussed as well as 42 Swedish authors who hadtheir works published in the series. While the serialisation of novels was a lucrativeform of publishing that reached readers of lesser means, it was abandoned in themiddle of the century due to rising postal fees. During their lifetime, however, theseries allowed for a new type of author to emerge, the professional with writing ashis or her sole occupation.34

In a subsequent study Furuland was able to continue her work on the birth of themodern author, studying the introduction of the works of James Fenimore Cooper,Edward Bulwer Lytton, Carl Spindler, Thomasine Gyllembourg, and George Sandin Sweden.35

34 G. Furuland,Romanen som vardagsvara. Förläggare, författare och skönlitterära häftesserieri Sverige 1833-1851 från Lars Johan Hierta till Albert Bonnier. Stockholm 2007. Adissertation in the same vein, but more on the history of ideas is G. Söderholm, Svea. Enlitterär kalender 1844-1907. Uppsala 2007.

35 G. Furuland, Från Banditen till Rosa och Blenda. Den gemensamma litterära marknadenoch fem översatta författare i 1800-talets Sverige. Uppsala 2010.


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Continuing with the nineteenth century, Roger Jacobson's dissertation on the spreadof print culture in northern Sweden represents a multifaceted and wide ranging study,tracking printers, bookshops, peddlers, readers, and reading societies. Jacobsonfollows the emergence and increasing interlinking of these individuals and institutionsin order to project a picture of how an oral communication culture turns into a onepropelled by the printed media.36

Moving into the first half of the next century,Mats Dolatkhah investigated readingpractices through interviews made during the 1970s and 1980s with adultsremembering their childhood. Dolatkhah stresses the inventiveness required of thechildren in finding reading material and suitable reading milieus; there were alsosocial impediments to overcome, and reading had to be, as Chartier reminds us,insubordinate. In another perspective, Dolatkhah concludes, their reading was notvery unlike present children's, practiced within an interplay of different media andsymbolic expressions.37

The book market in the late twentieth century was treated in the dissertations ofAnn Steiner and Åsa Warnquist. Steiner focused on the development of Swedishbook clubs and the strong position these obtained after the deregulation of the booktrade in 1970. The clubMånadens bok (Book of themonth) was particularly successfuland, Steiner states, contributed in a major way to the canonising of several of theauthors promoted by the club, as well as to the domination of realistic fiction duringthe decade.38 By statistical method Warnquist, on her part, evaluated the Swedishpublishing of poetry, inter alia confirming the assumption that publishers primarilyengage in these activities for the cultural rather than the monetary capital.39

Individual authors have been studied from various points relating to book history.Petra Söderlund, for example, has shed light on the ‘bibliographical codes’ in editionsof Selma Lagerlöf's novels and the reciprocal labor between author, publisher, andother advisors to make the books saleable. Söderlund also presents bibliographicalinvestigations into the relationship between different editions of some of the novels,providing an example of the critique against the concept of final intention in scholarlyediting.40

Concerning publishing history and textual criticism, Pia Forssell's dissertation onJ.L. Runeberg should also be mentioned. Forssell shows how the material conditionsof Runeberg's authorship have been systematically neglected in favour of an idealof the romantic poet, and how critical editions of Runeberg's works have changedshape according to the present textual ideals.41

36 R. Jacobsson, Typographic man.Medielandskap i förändring. Studier i provinsens tryckkultur.Stockholm 2009.

37 M. Dolatkhah, Det läsande barnet. Minnen av läspraktiker, 1900-1940. Borås 2011.38 A. Steiner, I litteraturens mitfåra Månadens bok och svensk bokmarknad under 1970-talet.

Göteborg/Stockholm 2006.39 Å. Warnquist, Poesifloden. Utgivning av diktsamlingar i Sverige 1976-1995. Lund 2007. A

similar study in method, but less comprehensive is S. Torgerson, Fiktionsprosa på svenska1901-1940. En utgivningssfatistik. Göteborg 2007.

40 P. Söderlund, Selma Lagerlöf & Co. Litteratursociologiska och textkritiska analyser. Uppsala2010.

41 P. Forssell, Författaren, förläggarna och forskarna. J.L. Runeberg och utgivningshistorieni Finland och Sverige. Helsingfors 2009. Some other studies focusing on the medial, materialand social circumstances of single authors can be mentioned: A. Nyblom, Ryktbarhetens


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A work by the late Bo Bennich-Björkman is concerned with both author biographyand library history. August Strindberg was for a while employed by the NationalLibrary in Stockholm and entrusted, among other things, with the cataloguing of aJapanese book collection bought by A.E. Nordenskiöld during his voyage throughthe Northeast Passage. Bennich-Björkman records Strindberg's involvement in thework and the contextual circumstances regarding him, the collection, and the finalpublication of the catalogue by Léon de Rosny.42

Nordenskiöld's son Otto and his voyages to Tierra del Fuego and the Antarcticaround 1900 are the subject of a short work in analytic bibliography by Rolf E.DuRietz. The printing of Nordenskjöld'sFrån Eldslandet (1898) andAntarctic (1904),chronicling the expeditions, are studied as well as the related work Bland pingvineroch sälar by S.A. Duse.43 DuRietz offers valuable insights into the bibliographicaltechniques that have to be employed when dealing with emissions in parts andcommercially produced books.Finishing the historical section of the survey there remains a publication on the

history of graphic design. Jan Jönsson's dissertation revises the former view of AndersBillow as the leading figure of the ‘new typography’ movement in Sweden. Throughdiscourse analysis, graphic design and typography are studied as dependent on thedevelopment in society at large, rather than of the autonomous hands of individuals.Billow is thus found to be more of a traditionalist, who only sparingly used radicaltypographical expressions.44

Methodological studies

In this category I have only two publications to note. The first is Mats Dahlstöm'sdissertation on the relationship between scholarly editing and bibliography. His pointof departure is a statement by Ross Atkinson, that editing is just another way of doingbibliography, i.e. constructing a surrogate document representing other documents.45

Dahlström finds that Atkinson is too much of a reductionist - the critical edition hasansikte. Verner von Heidenstam, medierna och personkulten i sekelskiftets Sverige. Stockholm2008; M. Gram, Viktor Rydberg. En läsande skald. Stockholm 2008; D. Hedman,Extravaganta eskapader. Gösta Palmcrantz' liv och verk. Uppsala 2008; J. Svedjedal,Kärlekär. Carl Jonas Love Almqvists författarliv 1793-1833. Stockholm 2007; id., Rosor, törnenCarl Jonas Love Almqvists författarliv 1833-1840. Stockholm 2008; id., Frihetens rena sak.Carl Jonas Love Almqvists författarliv 1841-1866. Stockholm 2009. Also to be noted isJohan Svedjedal's Spektrum. Den svenska drömmmen. Tidskrift och förlag i 1930-taletskultur. Stockholm 2011. The journal Spektrum was a primary voice of Swedish modernism- in the words of Svedjedal, the equivalent to the Bloomsbury set. It was edited by JosefRiwkin and involved authors such as Karin Boye, Agnes von Krusenstjerna and GunnarEkelöf.

42 B. Bennich-Björkman, Strindberg och Nordenskiölds japanska bibliotek. Stockholm 2007.43 R.E. DuRietz, Bibliografiska frågor och rön kring Otto Nordenskjölds expeditioner till södra

halvklotet 1895-1903. Uppsala 2006; also published, without pictorial content, in Text 6(2006) 4, 205-233.

44 J. Jönsson, Läsmaskinen. Aspekter på bild och bok med utgångspunkt i Anders Billowsverksamhet 1923-1953. Lund 2008.

45 R. Atkinson, ‘An application of semiotics to the definition of bibliography’, in: Studies inbibliography 33 (1980), 54-73.


more functions than the purely bibliographical - but that the edition, nevertheless,has evident historical connections to, and shares a number of similarities and problemswith, bibliography, particularly regarding the concepts clustering (the practice ofordering documents in relation to a common denominator, e.g. a work) andtransposition (the


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migration of the contents of the documents into new documents, e.g. bibliographiesand critical editions).46

The second and final title is a polemic work by the aforementioned DuRietz. Hefollows in the footsteps of G. Thomas Tanselle, Nicholson Baker and others, in acritique of libraries, librarianship, and library education. Several solutions to identifiedproblems within these sectors are presented. For instance, the first principle oflibraries, DuRietz argues, should be to preserve books, not ‘literature’ or ‘information’,which librarians seem to believe. A compromise could in his view be reached bydividing libraries into two classes: those intended for the dissemination of information,and those for the preservation and cataloguing of books. Furthermore, new,audiovisual and digital media, ought not to be the responsibility of libraries but beentrusted to institutions especially founded to care for these kinds of materials.47

Concluding discussion and future development

The above outline bears witness to a prospering and inventive research in many areasof the field of book history. Nonetheless, there remains much to be studied and studiedagain with new theoretical and methodical perspectives. Several questions centralto the field still await answers. Sten G. Lindberg pointed to some of these as earlyas 1988, but not many of his proposed projects have been fulfilled.48 Perhaps one ofthe most important, a general history of Swedish book history still awaits its author(s).In contrast to Undorf (2009) I am not of the opinion that the absence of general

methodological and theoretical discussions is as pervading as he suggests. Thesediscussions have, however, taken place in domains slightly removed from the strictlyhistorical part (the Darnton definition, one might say) of book history, such asbibliography and textual scholarship. In the works of DuRietz they have, for instance,always been present, and Dahlström (2006 and subsequent articles) makes recentsignificant contributions. Other examples come from the conferences on methods intextual scholarship organised by Svenska vitterhetssamfundet and Nordiskt nätverkför editionsfilologer. In another vein Götselius' (2010) and to some extent my ownstudy (2011) offer quite theorised historical perspectives. In the past, the problemseems to have been an unwillingness by the larger book historical community toreadily answer or ‘test’ such initiatives, due to locked institutional and traditionalpositions. With a younger generation of (hopefully) unprejudiced scholars morefruitful and free-minded discussions and debates regarding the identity and aims ofScandinavian book history may perhaps take place.

46 M. Dahlström, Under utgivning. Den vetenskapliga utgivningens bibliografiska funktion.Borås 2006.

47 R.E. DuRietz, Kulturarvshyckleriet. Bibliofobi, ignorans och info-fundamentalism bakomdagens bibliotekskatastrof? Uppsala 2010.

48 S.G. Lindberg, ‘Bokhistoria som vetenskap. Dess ställning och uppgift i vår tids bildningsliv’,in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och biblioteksväsen 75 (1988), 97-109.


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Figure 4. Botanical illustration from C. Lindman, Bilder ur Nordens flora. Stockholm 1917-1926.The lithographic technique facilitated a more reliable reproduction of colors and fine hairs and texturesthan the preceding method of coloring by hand, as discussed by Törnvall 2013. Image courtesy ofProject Runeberg (runeberg.org)


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It is not a coincidence that doctoral dissertations are strongly present in this survey.It points to a strong interest in book history among younger researchers, and a healthypromise for the future. Several of them are already at work on new projects withinthe field. Just to mention a few: Anna-Maria Rimm is studying the import and exportof books in Sweden during the eighteenth century; Thomas Götselius investigateshow Swedish society and individuals were affected by the increasing literacy ratesaround 1700; Kristina Lundblad has recently acquired funds for a project on howliterature operates through different media in the present world, and what implicationsthis has for our understanding of the relation between books and literature, their valueand functions in society.There are also dissertations in the making. In Lund, for instance, Gunilla Törnvall,

Maria Simonsen, and Ragni Svensson are occupiedwith graduate projects on botanicalillustrations, Scandinavian encyclopedias, and the publishing house of Bo Caveforsrespectively.49

A fruitful way to enhance Swedish and generally Nordic research, and to bettercommunicate it, would be to re-establish Nordisk tidskrift för bok- ochbibliotekshistoria or to found a new, peer-reviewed journal (paper or digital) for theNordic countries.50 Biblis is valuable, but, at present, does not meet scholarlystandards, and is partly addressed to the general public. DuRietz's Text, scholarlyenough, is unfortunately too much of a one man project, and will probably not surviveits founder. In addition, the journal has never managed to be accepted within thelarger scholarly community.While the research part of Swedish book history seems vigorous enough, the

educational section could be better developed, not at least to better facilitate andutilise the apparently large interest in book history among undergraduate and graduatestudents. Beside courses given at the book history department in Lund and the onestaught sporadically in the curricula of library studies at various universities, thereare few if any courses to meet this interest. Lindberg, in 1988, said that to becomea book historian in Sweden you had to be an autodidact, and it is unfortunately stillvery much so.51

The lack of textbooks in Swedish and written from a Swedish viewpoint is anotherproblem. I am myself currently writing one, which will hopefully somewhat amendthe situation, but still modern broad-ranging overviews are missing.52However, witha growing body of book historians there are incentives for courses to be taught inother places than Lund, and for synthesising projects of the desired kind. Researchand education are intimately related, each enhancing the other. If the expansion ofbook history as a field of research is a desirable goal for the future, then we mustpay more attention to the ways in which budding scholars may be brought to thesubject.

49 Törnvall will have defended her dissertation when this article goes to print: Botaniska bildertill allmänheten. Om utgivningen av Carl Lindmans Bilder ur Nordens flora. Stockholm2013.

50 Such plans have been discussed, but as yet without any substantial result. See Undorf,‘Research in Scandinavian 15th-18th century book and library history 1950-2008’.

51 Lindberg, ‘Bokhistoria som vetenskap’, 98.52 R. Wingård, Bokhistoria. En introduktion. Lund [to be published].


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Peter KornickiRecent work on the history of the book in Japan*

Over the last ten years the monographs and journals devoted mainly or partially tothe history of the book in Japan and to Japanese bibliography have inevitably beensupplemented by internet resources, many of which have made themselvesindispensable. One of the most important of these is an online catalogue and findinglist of all Japanese books and manuscripts produced before 1868. The cut-off dateis that of the so-called Meiji Restoration, which is commonly taken to mark the birthof ‘modern’ Japan, but it did not in fact mark the end of woodblock printing, so itsrelevance for bibliographic purposes is debatable. Be that as it may, this onlinedatabase was initially based on previously-published catalogues but it is constantlybeing supplemented by new data; the books listed are, with a handful of exceptions,all to be found in libraries in Japan, but the contents of European libraries are coveredin a parallel database, and both are available on the website of the National Instituteof Japanese Literature.1

It should be noted that the definition of what constitutes a Japanese book is notthe same in these two invaluable databases: in the former, texts written in China orKorea and (re)printed in Japan are excluded, while in the latter such texts are included,on the ground that they contain prefaces and explanatory glosses aimed at Japanesereaders. There are, however, other databases which record, respectively, the locationsof Chinese texts in Japanese libraries, irrespective of whether they were producedin Japan, Korea or China, and the locations of Chinese texts written by Japaneseauthors.2 So far, however, there are no similar databases for finding rare Japanesebooks held in North American, Chinese or Korean libraries, and even publishedcatalogues are few.3 In addition to these

* Japanese names in this article are given in the usual Japanese order, family name first.1 These databases, the Union Catalogue of Early Japanese Books (Nihon kotenseki sō gō

mokuroku dētā bēsu) and the Union Catalogue of Early Japanese Books in Europe, areaccessible at www.nijl.ac.jp/pages/database/. The latter is searchable in roman script(base1.nijl.ac.jp/infolib/meta_pub/OSHDefault.exe?DB_ID=G0000302OSH&GRP_ID=G0000302&DEF_XSL=eng&IS_TYPE=csv&IS_STYLE=eng)and includes Japanese editions of Chinese texts. I should declare an interest as the compilerof the latter.

2 These are accessible at kanji.zinbun.kyoto-u.ac.jp/kanseki? detail andwww.nishogakusha-kanbun.net/database/, but neither is exhaustive.

3 Catalogues of the collections of the Harvard-Yenching Institute and the University ofCalifornia at Berkeley and at Los Angeles have now been published: Oka Masahiko [et al.](eds.), Hā bā do Enkyō toshokan washo mokuroku. Tokyo 1994; id., Kariforunia DaigakuBākurēkō shozō Mitsui Bunko kyūzō Edo hanpon shomoku. Tokyo 1990; Suzuki Jun [et al.](eds.),Kariforunia Daigaku Rosanzerusukō shoozō Nihon kotenseki mokuroku. Tokyo 2000.


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databases, there is also a growing number of digitalised versions of rare booksavailable on the internet, to be downloaded as pdfs or to be examined on screen, butthere are far too many to be listed here.The development of reliable electronic archives and databases does not mean to

say that monographic publishing is being replaced by digital. In the 1970s two seriesof volumes on bibliographic topics were launched, consisting either of monographsor of reprinted source materials: the series published by Yumani Shobō, Shoshishomoku shiriizu [Bibliographic catalogue series], was launched in 1976 and nowamounts to 98 titles in 616 volumes, while the other, Nihon shoshigaku taikei[Japanese bibliographic compendium], launched by Seishōdō Shoten in 1978, nowamounts to 100 titles in 168 volumes. The most recent volume in the latter series isa catalogue of calligraphic manuals published in Japan in the Edo period (1600-1868),compiled by the renowned bibliographer and historian of the book, NakanoMitsutoshi.These books all come from his own collection and many are not recorded elsewhere:the accompanying volume of plates demonstrates the potential of xylography forreproducing calligraphic art and reveals that many of these books were printed withwhite text on a black background, in an attempt to approximate to the results whenrubbings are made from stone engravings.4

In addition to these two massive series, the publication of several detailedbibliographies and a thorough encyclopaedia of bibliographical terminology testifyto a growing interest in the history of the book in Japan.5 It remains largely true,however, that resources for the history of the book held in libraries outside Japan areneglected. For example, in 2011 a volumewas published which attempted to identifyall extant copies of all dated imprints produced between 1591 and 1658. This periodis important because it was during those years that typography flourished, after itsintroduction both from Korea and, in the hands of the Jesuits, from Macau, and thenwaned as the ease of including glosses and illustrations gave xylography the edge,and this volume is the first attempt at a comprehensive bibliography year by year.6

However, it is regrettable that although it includes books printed in Japan duringthose years in Chinese and even Latin in addition to Japanese, it pays no attentionto imprints in foreign libraries. Thus the 1595 edition of Hokke shiki engi, acommentary on the Lotus sūtra in Cambridge University Library, is ignored, forthere is no copy in Japan; and the many dated imprints produced between 1591 and1658 now preserved in the British Library, in the Nordenskiöld Collection inStockholm and in other collections are overlooked altogether. This neglect isunnecessary in view of the fact that many foreign collections are fully described incatalogues written in Japanese and most collections in Europe are covered by theonline database mentioned above.

4 Nakano Mitsutoshi,Wakoku hōchō. 2 vols., Tokyo 2012.5 Suzuki Toshiyuki (ed.), Kinsei shoseki kenkyūbunken mokuroku. Revised and enlarged

edition, Tokyo 2007; Nunokawa Kakuzaemon [et al.] (eds.),Nihon shuppan kankei shomoku1868-1996. Tokyo 2003; Inoue Muneo [et al.] (eds.), Nihon kotenseki shoshigaku jiten.Tokyo 1999.

6 Oka Masahiko [et al.] (eds.), Edo jidai shoki shuppan nenpyō. Tokyo 2011.


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Figure 1. Tōsō kaiso jijojō, a collection of prefaces supposedly in the hands of Buddhist monks ofthe Tang dynasty. This Japanese edition, printed with white text on black background like a rubbingof an inscription, was published in 1661. Author's collection


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Books and manuscripts in the Edo period

Like most of the databases and reference materials mentioned so far, studies of thehistory of the book in Japan concentrate on the Edo period, when commercialpublishing came of age and when, in the space of a few decades, books - which hadonce been rare and precious objects - became familiar goods to be bought in shopsor borrowed from circulating libraries. In research on that period, one of the principaldevelopments over the last decade in Japan has been the extension of research frommainstream topics into areas that have largely been neglected hitherto.7 The first ofthese is manuscript publication and circulation, the second is the rural consumptionof books, and the third is the flow of books from Korea and China.The most important recent contribution on manuscript traditions was made by

Hashiguchi Kōnosuke, who is the owner of an antiquarian bookshop in Tokyo andhas published several volumes on the book trade in the Edo period. He has made athorough assessment of the proportion of books in circulation in the Edo period thatwere manuscripts and his conclusion is that they amounted to around two-fifths ofall books.8 Although the simultaneous presence in the book market of manuscriptsand printed books in this period is not a new discovery, Hashiguchi has forced us torealise that we have long been underestimating the importance of manuscripts in thebook trade.His figures are borne out by the preponderance of manuscripts in many rural

collections that have survived intact. Many of these manuscripts were either copiesof printed books or local histories that would be unlikely to have been commercialpropositions, but there was also a large number of illicit manuscripts in circulation.This is also indicated by edicts issued in the 1720s that sought in vain to restrict theircirculation, and these illicit manuscripts have now begun to be studied as a genre ofliterary production, for many of them were fictionalised versions of contemporaryscandals.9

The second area is book consumption in rural areas in the Edo period. One of themost productive and original historians of the book in recent years has been SuzukiToshiyuki. His recent study of what he calls the ‘reading fever’ that took hold ofJapan in the late eighteenth century and its impact upon the book trade analyses thespread of the reading habit from the big cities to rural areas.10 Using farmers' diaries,book trade records and other sources he shows how the major booksellers of Edo(modern Tokyo) and Osaka spread their operations into rural areas and how localmarkets developed and were furnished with books, increasingly in the case of ruraltowns and cities by their own retailers. The most striking part of the book, however,is that in which he unravels the publishing history of a series of editions of Chineseclassics published

7 Although this research is only accessible to those who can read Japanese, the work of someJapanese scholars has been translated into French in C.-A. Brisset [et al.] (ed.), Du pinceauà la typographie. Regards japonais sur l'écriture et le livre. Paris/Tokyo 2006. See also A.T.Kamei-Dyche, ‘The history of books and print culture in Japan: the state of the discipline’,in: Book history 14 (2011), 270-304.

8 Hashiguchi Kōnosuke, Edo no hon'ya to honzukuri. Tokyo 2011, chapter 5.9 For example: Kikuchi Yōsuke, Kinsei jitsuroku no kenkyū. Tokyo 2008.10 Suzuki Toshiyuki, Edo no dokushonetsu: jigaku suru dokusha to shoseki ryūtsū Tokyo 2007.


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under the rubric ‘Keiten yoshi’ (‘Too many teachers’).

Figure 2. Katakiuchi hashibasusumi, an early nineteenth-century illicit manuscript on a vendettainvolving a samurai. This copy carries numerous impressions of the seal of a circulating library inSendai. Author's collection

The first set was an edition of the Four Books of the Confucian tradition (TheAnalects, Mencius, Great Learning and Doctrine of the Mean), published in tenvolumes in 1786. These were designed to be accessible to readers with minimaleducation who nevertheless wished to acquire some sinological learning, which wasthe hallmark of being educated throughout pre-modern East Asia. Thus they includedthe most basic information, explanatory essays and even, in the upper margin, acomplete guide to reading the Chinese text aloud in Japanese, in a translation basedclosely on the original. The Chinese classics had never


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been made so accessible before, but Suzuki's real achievement has been to prove justhow popular they were: by comparing dozens of extant copies he has establishedthat the printing blocks for that 1786 edition quickly became worn out and werereplaced in 1794, and again in 1824, 1842, 1852 and 1871. To put this in perspective,we need to remember that xylographic printing blocks are generally thought to havebeen capable of producing around 8,000 copies, depending on the kind of wood used,and that many sets of printing blocks prepared in the seventeenth century were stillbeing used a hundred or more years later. In this case, the blocks needed replacing(requiring a renewed capital investment) within twenty years of publication and thedemand required this to be done every twenty years. Not even the most popular worksof fiction at the time could match this level of popularity. What Suzuki's researchhas shown, then, is that we have been too quick to assume that fiction dominated themarket, and that teach-yourself books, exemplified by the ‘Toomany teachers’ series,demonstrate a thirst for sinological knowledge among readers who had hitherto notbeen able to approach Chinese books. These books gave them access not only toprestige texts but also to the vocabulary, diction and ethical maxims that gave thema claim to be educated. At the heart of this phenomenon was growing socialdifferentiation especially in rural areas where the literate successfully distinguishedthemselves from their humbler neighbours by collecting books and aligningthemselves culturally with their samurai superiors.Over the last two decades there has been growing interest in the contents of rural

book collections, which in many cases have survived unscathed and intact from theEdo period to the present day in rural households, while urban collections havemostlylong since been broken up or destroyed by fire. The contents are often surprising:banned books, poetry collections, local histories, and so on, most of themmanuscripts.Apart from testifying to the profusion of manuscripts in circulation they also bearwitness to rising levels of cultural sophistication in rural areas, particularly in thecases of village headmen, who were required to be literate in order to communicateby letter with the authorities. Sugi Hitoshi has produced a detailed study whichexplores the cultural life of people living in rural areas, focusing on some harbourtowns, a post town on the Tōkaidō between Edo and Osaka and a mountain villagein Shinano. In each case there is ample evidence of literary and cultural activities inthe form of book collections, poetry composition and even local publishing.11

Collections of haiku poetry published privately by the members of a local poetryclub were the most common, but there were also collections of poetry in Chinese, avolume of biographies of local celebrities in the port town of Uraga put together bythe leader of the local dried-sardine producers' guild and treatises on the rearing ofsilk worms. It is clear that certainly by the early nineteenth century educated andliterate men and women in rural areas formed ties with likeminded people in theneighbourhood not only to exchange books originating from the big cities but alsoto be creatively productive themselves.Finally, connections with continental Asia and the flow of books to Japan have

begun to be taken seriously and to be explored in detail by a few scholars. Ōba Osamuand Wang Yong have been meticulous in their examinations of the importation of

11 Sugi Hitoshi, Kinsei no zaison bunka to shomotsu shuppan. Tokyo 2009.


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books from China: diaries and extant copies of imported books provide a wealth ofinformation and, for the Edo period, we have even cargo manifests listing booksimported via Nagasaki.12 In the case of Korea, FujimotoYukio has published numerousbibliographical studies and, more recently, the first of four projected volumes of anexhaustive catalogue of old Korean books in Japanese libraries, many of which werebrought to Japan during the invasion of Korea launched by Toyotomi Hideyoshi inthe 1590s.13 Meanwhile Mayanagi Makoto and Machi Senjūrō have explored theimpact of Chinese and Korean medical treatises on Japan.14

Figure 3. Rokuso daishi hōbōdangyō, a Chinese Zen text known as the Platform sutra of the SixthPatriarch. This Japanese edition, printed in 1634 with glosses for the convenience of Japanese readers,carries extensive marginalia which are dated 1645. Author's collection

12 Ōba Osamu, Kanseki yunyū no bunkashi - Shōtohu taishi kara Yoshimune e. Tokyo 1997;Wang Yong, Shomotsu no chūnichi kōryūshi Tokyo 2005.

13 Fujimoto Yukio,Nihon genzon chōsenbon kenkyū - shūbu. Kyoto 2006. See also my ‘Koreanbooks in Japan: from the 1590s to the end of the Edo period’, forthcoming in: Journal of theAmerican Oriental Society 133 (2013).

14 Some of Mayanagi's many works are available on his website: see for example his study ofimported Chinese medical books and Japanese reprints of them in the course of the Edoperiod in mayanagi.hum.ibaraki.ac.jp/paper01/ImportedChMedBooksBig5.html.Machi hasstudied imported Koreanmedical books, for example in his ‘Manase Yōan'in-ke to chōsenbonisho’, in: Nihon skisō bunka kenkyū 2 (2009) 1, 19-46.


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Figure 4. Zōho shojaku mokuroku, the booksellers' catalogue of 1670, showing the end of the tableof contents, listing ephemeral items at the end, and, on the left, the colophon giving the date 1670and the names of the two publishers in Edo and Kyoto. Author's collection

Studies by European and American scholars

Although most of the work done on the history of the book in Japan is beingundertaken by Japanese scholars, there is a growing number of European andAmerican scholars whose works are significant and in some cases fill lacunae in theJapanese research output.15 Prominent in this connection is the work of Lukacs onmarginalia in Japanese medical books: hitherto marginalia have attracted littleattention, with the rare exception of those written by some famous individual, andthere has been no systematic study of the phenomenon in Japanese.16 Lukacs hasmade a detailed study of the extensive marginalia, for the most part written in literaryChinese, in his collection of Japanese medical books. Amongst them he found,astonishingly, some marginalia dated before the date of publication of the book inwhich they were inscribed. The explanation, he rightly concludes, is that marginaliaby learned commentators were sometimes so highly valued as to be copied fromperhaps a borrowed original edition into a newer edition, with the dates transcribedas in the original edition.

15 For an up-to-date bibliography of work in Western languages on the history of the book inJapan see www.ames.cam.ac.uk/jbib/edosoc7.html.

16 G. Lukacs, Extensive marginalia in old Japanese medical books. Piribebuy 2010.


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Some other recent studies in European languages deserve mention here. Firstly,Moretti has published a detailed study of the booksellers' catalogues which wereprinted in the Edo period from the 1660s onwards.17 The earliest catalogues revealquite clearly that the mainstay of the publishing industry in the seventeenth centurywas not the thin stream of new works of Japanese literature that have been the focusof much research, but the veritable flood of reprinted Chinese works, including bothBuddhist texts and doctrinal works on the one hand and Confucian texts on the other:the latter in particular were available in a bewildering variety of formats that isevidence of the strong demand. Moretti reveals the shifts in the hierarchy of genresover time and emphasizes that the booksellers' catalogueswere primarily a commercialtool produced by commercial booksellers to facilitate sales. They naturally ignoredthe competition provided by manuscripts and imported editions, and thus cannot betaken to be a snapshot of books on the market, but they do tell us how booksellerscategorised and prioritised their wares and this provides us with a very differentperspective on the book market from that of literary historians who focus on Japaneseliterary works, which turn out to have been a rather small part of the market. Secondly,Amaury García Rodríguez has taken advantage of the recent acceptance of eroticpublishing of the Edo period as a subject of serious study to produce a thoroughexamination of the vexed question of censorship as it affected erotic publications.18

And finally, Mary Berry, in a wide-ranging book partly based on her familiarity withthe superb collection of old Japanese books at Berkeley, has explored the socialconsequences of print from the seventeenth century onwards.19 She points to thecreation of a public market for books as commercial publishing made them familiargoods and then to the emergence of new kinds of knowledge once knowledge ceasedto be the privilege of the educated elite. She describes this as a ‘library of publicinformation’ and as components she draws attention to the huge number ofcommercially-published maps in circulation and to the publication of directories ofgoods and services, guidebooks, household encyclopaedias and a host of works whichpurport to convey up-to-date information. The ingenuity of publishers in devisingnew informative print genres and creating markets for them reveals the degree towhich knowledge was being driven by commerce.

Reading traditions

In many other areas of study there have been important developments which areworth mentioning. The most important of these is the study of Japanese writing inChinese, which for long had been much neglected, and the study of the practice ofkundoku. Kundoku is a method whereby texts written in Chinese can be read inJapanese, by means of the addition of various glosses and pointers which enablereaders to rearrange the

17 L. Moretti, ‘The Japanese early-modern publishing market unveiled: a survey of Edo-periodbooksellers' catalogues’, in: East Asian publishing and society 2 (2012), 201-310.

18 A.A. García Rodríguez,El control de la estampa erótica japonesa shunga. Pedregal de SantaTeresa 2011.

19 M.E. Berry, Japan in print: information and nation in the early modern period. Berkeley2006.


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Figure 5. Onna teikin gosho bunko, a conduct book for women based on supposedly courtly tastesand published in Kyoto in 1790. The page shown introduces various games involving shells andperfumes associated with the Tale of Genji Author's collection


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order of the Chinese words so that they conform to Japanese word order; it had itscounterpart in Korea, and it is thought that it was transmitted to Japan in the eighthcentury. This practice developed before the invention of scripts to write Japaneseand Korean, and it is probably best understood as a form of translation which isrealised by the reader but which is bound by the vocabulary of the Chinese text beingread. Two substantial collections of essays have explored the phenomenon throughoutEast Asia and have exposed the multiplicity of kundoku practices: each set of glossesrepresented an interpretation of the Chinese text, and so the same text could generatequite different glosses depending upon the interpretation chosen.20 To some extentthis created the illusion that ancient Chinese texts were actually written in Japanese,and in the eighteenth century Ogyū Sorai emphasized that Chinese texts were writtenin a foreign language and that the only authentic ways in which to approach thosetexts were either by having a thorough grasp of literary Chinese or through writtentranslation in which obscure vocabulary in the original was rendered comprehensiblyin Japanese. Nevertheless, kundoku remained the standard way of reading Chinesetexts and is still taught in Japanese schools today.There has been a growing interest in women's writing and reading in the Edo

period and in the publication of calligraphy manuals and moral primers for women.Many of these primers and manuals have now either been reproduced in facsimileor are available as images on the website of Nara Women's University.21 The mostnotorious of the conduct books for women was Onna daigaku (Greater learning forwomen), which seems to have been first published in the early eighteenth century,but it has now come to be understood that the moral message became graduallyattenuated in later editions, to the extent that they became compendia of useful andpractical information rather than conduct books.22 Needless to say, conduct booksfor women were by no means the only books actually read by women, and a numberof studies have focused on women's reading as revealed in diaries and letters or ontheir activities as poets and writers in various genres.23

Mention should also be made here of recent work in a few other areas. Firstly,ownership seals provide valuable information about the provenance of books andmake it possible to reassemble the dispersed collections of significant figures fromthe past. Since these ownership seals are often written in decorative script they arefrequently difficult to read and to identify correctly. For this reason volumes providingindices and

20 Nakamura Shunsaku [et al.] (ed.),Kundokuron: higashi Ajia kanbun sekai to nihongo. Tokyo2008; id., Zoku kundokuron: higashi ajia kanbun sekai no keisei. Tokyo 2010. See also D.B.Lurie, Realms of literacy: early Japan and the history of writing, Cambridge, Mass., 2011;R.E. Clements, ‘A cultural history of translation in early-modern Japan’, unpublished PhDdissertation, University of Cambridge, 2011.

21 See www.lib.nara-wu.ac.jp/nwugdb/jindex.html. On calligraphy manuals for women, seeKoizumi Yoshinaga, Nyohitsu tehon kaidai. Musashi-murayama 1998.

22 See the collection of facsimiles in Koizumi Yoshinaga (ed.), Onna daigaku shiryō shūsei.21 vols., Tokyo 2003-2006.

23 Ōguchi Yūjirō (ed.), Rai Baishi nikki no kenkyū. Tokyo 2001; Fukazawa Akio, Iseki Takakono kenkyū. Osaka 2004; Maeda Yoshi, Kinsei nyonin no tabi nikki shū. Fukuoka 2001. Seealso D. Ko [et al.] (ed.),Women and Confucian cultures in premodern China, Korea, andJapan Berkeley 2003; B. Gramlich-Oka, Thinking like a man: Tadano Makuzu (1763-1825).Leiden 2006; P.F. Kornicki [et al.] (ed.), The female as subject: Women and the book inJapan. Ann Arbor 2010.


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reproductions of seals and identifying their owners are invaluable, and there havebeen some recent additions to the growing number of such volumes.24 Secondly,paper has been in extensive use in Japan since the seventh century at least, and itgoes without saying that its quality and characteristics are essential considerationswhen assessing the authenticity and age of manuscripts. The recent publication ofan encyclopaedic work on the usage of paper in documentary contexts as well asbooks of all kinds has served to draw attention to the fundamental material thatunderpins book culture in Japan and to the significance of variations in its usage.25

Official constraints and the socio-political context

Let me continue this survey of work on the history of the book in Japan by consideringthe writings of Fujizane Kumiko, who has published two major monographs, whichare provocative and more ambitious in their scope than most other works. The firstof these was a detailed investigation of bukan, which were directories of samuraigiving their ranks, stipends and crests and which were published from 1644 until1868, when the samurai regime collapsed.26 These directories provided an intimateglimpse of the ruling class in Japan and were constantly updated by altering thewooden printing blocks. In general commercial publishers were not allowed to printanything containing the names of the ruling samurai class but an exception wasmadefor bukan, and it is clear that the compilation and publication of these works dependedupon official patronage as well as the commercial nous of Kyoto publishers whorealised that the newly-established samurai regime generated a need for informationabout its membership that could be satisfied by print.Fujizane's more recent and even more ambitious book is a wide-ranging

examination of Edo-period book culture in its socio-political context.27 Havingemphasized in her previous book the official constraints under which publishersoperated, at the outset of her second book she explores these constraints further,noting not only that the regime began to direct censorious attention to commercialpublishing in 1644, much earlier than hitherto accepted, but also that the formationof guilds in all walks of commercial life imposed sanctions and controls on membersof the same trade. She then considers seventeenth-century books from the point ofview of their role in the distribution of knowledge, seeing books which did notcirculate through commercial networks - such as manuscripts and private publications- as constituting a ‘closed’ form of knowledge distribution. Although it is refreshingto encounter an approach that attempts to see the book in seventeenth-century Japanin all its manifestations, it seems to me that a binary distinction does not stand up toclose scrutiny, for some manuscripts were pro-

24 Kokuritsu Kokkai Toshokan (ed.), Hito to zōsho to zōshoin: Kokurtsu Kokkai Toshokanshozōhon kara Tokyo 2002. There is now also a useful and growing database:base1.nijl.ac.jp/~collectors_seal/.

25 Shishikura Satoshi (ed.), Kotenseki komonjo ryōshi jiten. Tokyo 2011.26 Fujizane Kumiko, Bukan shuppan to kinsei shakai. Tokyo 1999.27 Fujizane Kumiko, Kinsei shoseki bunkaron. Tokyo 2006.


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Figure 6. Daibirushana jōbutsu kyōsho, a Buddhist commentary printed on Mt. Kōya, to the southof Nara, in 1278. This is one of the few texts printed in medieval Japan which was accompanied bysome illustrations. Author's collection


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duced in multiple copies for illicit sale and for distribution through circulatinglibraries: in effect they were published. What is original and interesting about heranalysis, however, is her ensuing focus on regime historiography, which shows thatsome historical accounts which touched upon the sensitive matter of the foundationof the regime remained in the form of manuscripts for controlled circulation whileothers were permitted to be published by commercial publishers connected to theregime. There is insufficient space here to do justice to this rich and rewarding book,which successfully makes the case for the importance of book history to social andpolitical historians.The one obvious lacuna remains the economic aspects of the history of the book

in the Edo period. Some of the booksellers' catalogues give prices for the bookslisted, but we do not even know whether these represent the retail or the wholesaleprices. Detailed information on the economic costs of producing a book in terms ofthe proportional costs of the materials, of the labour involved in carving the printingblocks, of the finishing and binding processes is wanting, and publishers' archivesthat might cast light on the economics of publishing have yet to be found. This isparticularly unfortunate, since most publishing in the Edo period was carried out bycommercial publishers whose livelihood depended on commercial success.

The history of the book before the Edo period

This essay may have given the impression that there was no history of the bookbefore the Edo period, and it is undoubtedly true that an overwhelming proportionof work devoted to the history of the book is devoted to the Edo period. However,since printing began in Japan in the eighth century and was practiced continuously,albeit not commercially, from the twelfth to sixteenth centuries, there is clearly arich field of study yet to be exploited. This is not to say that there have not beenstudies of the earliest uses of printing in the eighth century, or of the manuscripttradition of the Tale of Genji, which has recently been shown to have been morecomplex than hitherto supposed.28

The manuscript culture and limited print culture of medieval Japan have been thesubject of some precisely focused studies, but there has hitherto been little effort tograsp the role and significance of books in medieval society. Gomi Fumihiko hasattempted to do just this in a book entitled ‘The medieval history of the book’, butit should be noticed that his attention is focused on Japanese literary writings and heneglects to consider the role of imports from Song and Ming China, to say nothingof nonliterary texts or literary texts written by Japanese in literary Chinese.29 Untilthe 1590s, the few books that were printed in Japan were almost exclusively Buddhisttexts in Chinese, with the sole exceptions of a fewChinese medical texts and editionsof the Analects and theGreat Learning. As a result Japanese texts were only availablein the form

28 Masuda Harumi (ed.), Hyakumantō darani no kenkyū - Seikadō Bunko shozōbon o chūshinTokyo 2007; see also my ‘The Hyakumantō Darani and the origins of printing ineighth-century Japan’, in: International journal of Asian studies 9 (2012), 1-28. On theGenji,see Ikeda Kazuomi, Ōse de yomu Genji moonogatari. Tokyo 2008.

29 Gomi Fumihiko, Shomotsu no chūseishi. Tokyo 2003.


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of manuscripts, often transmitted through families that kept their treasures fromprying eyes, and the only non-Buddhist printed texts in circulation were imports fromChina and occasionally from Korea as well.Gomi begins his study with a consideration of Honchō shojaku mokuroku

(Catalogue of the books of our country), a rather mysterious cataloguewhich probablydates back to the late Kamakura period (1185-1333) and survives today in more thanseventy manuscript copies. It lists 493 Japanese works. What it is a catalogue of isunclear, for the compiler clearly had some of the works listed to hand while othersare mentioned by title and are said not to be available. Nevertheless, it is importantfor the fact that 299 of the books listed are no longer extant and are known solely orprincipally from this catalogue, and for the fact that the compiler divided the booksinto twenty categories, this being the first attempt to bring order to the multitude ofbooks by categorising them. Thus the world of the medieval book that Gomi describesis inevitably a partial one, constrained on the one hand by the loss of many works ofJapanese literature during the centuries when Japanese writings circulated only inmanuscript, and on the other hand by adopting the same focus as the catalogue andleaving out of the picture the many texts in classical Chinese which circulated eitherin manuscript or in imported printed editions. This side of the picture is becomingclearer thanks to the works mentioned above and to studies like that of TakahashiSatoshi, which unravels the complex antecedents of the Japanese manuscript traditionof Zhu Xi's commentaries on the Analects.30 But there is much work to be done,particularly with regard to imports from China and Korea before 1600, manuscripttraditions and the uses of print. Why, for example, was neither the Tale of Genji norany other work of Japanese literature printed before 1600, even though individualswere happy to sponsor the printing of works in Chinese? The voluminous diaries ofthe courtier and scholar Sanjōnishi Sanetaka (1455-1537) reveal that, while printedtexts were already familiar objects either as imports or as Buddhist texts printed inJapan, scholars still lived and worked in a scribal world in which a courtier with afine calligraphic hand was constantly required to producemanuscript copies of classicworks.31 This scribal world is described in detail in his diaries and those of othercourtiers, but it is yet to be studied; so great is the current concentration of effort onthe Edo period.

30 Takahashi Satoshi,Muromachi jidai koshōhon Rongo shikkai no kenkyū. Tokyo 2008.31 For a glimpse of the possibilities, see Haga Kōshirō, Higashiyama bunka no kenkyū. Kyoto

1981, vol. 1, 106-119. A detailed study of a manuscript from the tail end of this tradition hasbeen discussed and reproduced in C.-A. Brisset and P. Griolet, La vie du Buddha racontéeet illustré au Japon. Paris 2010.


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Figure 1. Should racism be purged from new editions of classic children's books? Image from a songbook by Norway's most beloved children's author, composer and illustrator, Torbjørn Egner (1951).Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague. See pages 149-150


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Aina NødingBook History in NorwayFrom peasant readers to reading Ibsen

When Robert Darnton visited the University of Oslo around the year 2000, a smallgroup of dedicated fans came to hear him talk on his latest findings in French bookhistory. Ten years later, he visited Oslo as a household name in many disciplines,with an accordingly high turnout to his talk. This development does not only reflectthe growth of Darnton's reputation as a major figure in cultural and book history,but, more importantly, the growing interest in the field of book history amongNorwegians. To mark this new and growing interest, and to make an academicstatement, the anthologyBokhistorie (Book history) was published in 2003, compilingarticles mainly on Norwegian literature from a book historical point of view.1

Still, there is no general Norwegian book historical society as such at the moment,although there is an informal network of scholars, librarians and others. Many ofthem also take part in a Scandinavian network, calledNordisk Forum for Boghistorie.2With, in many respects, a common history and related languages, collaboration acrossthe Scandinavian borders seems particularlymeaningful. There is a Norwegian societyspecifically for library history whose members are currently from the library sciencesonly, but which might expand to include more disciplines in the future.3 TheNorwegian book historians come from a wide range of disciplines and institutions:universities and university colleges, The National Library and The National Archives,to mention a few. They naturally tend to focus on fields and topics related to theirmain activity. Still, there is quite a bit of interdisciplinary activity and exchangegoing on, in terms of seminars, teaching and publications. Even with this increasedinterest and level of activity, there is not yet an academic chair or degree in bookhistory. Classes are taught at the Universities of Oslo and Tromsø and the UniversityCollege of Oslo and Akershus. Several postgraduates (PhD and Master) in these andother academic institutions are or have been writing on book historical topics, whichgives great hopes for the future. The following presentation will sketch some of themain topics and fields of interest today.

1 T. Rem (ed.) Bokhistorie. Oslo 2003.2 Visit the home page www.nffb.wordpress.com for more information on its activities and

members.3 Norsk Bok- og Bibliotekhistorisk Selskap, established in 1998. Home page: www.nbbs.no.


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Book collections, library history and bibliography

Unlike major European countries, Norway has few old and special book collectionsor libraries. Even so, some book collections have come into the fore in Norwegianbook history in recent years. A very thorough and informative contribution in thatrespect is Gina Dahl's Books in Early Modern Norway (2011).4 In this work, Dahl(University of Bergen) traces the dissemination of books in the seventeenth andeighteenth centuries mainly by analysing book inventories and catalogues of privatecollections. Even with the limitations such an approach presents her with, it stillproduces a surprising image of Norwegian readers as fully integrated in the Europeanbook market of the time, including most learned professions, as well as readers ofpopular literature. What the picture will look like for the nineteenth century remainsto be seen. Elisabeth Eide (The National Library) is currently writing a book onprivate book collections and reading societies in the nineteenth century.5Her articlespublished so far on the subject cover reading societies and private book collectionsof both farmers and higher officials. She discusses book ownership and reading inall social layers of society, and shows there were marked differences in tastes: mainlyreligious reading among peasants, entertaining novels among the bourgeoisie, andtheology, law and history among the officials.6 Library history was also the topic ofan anthology published by The National Library in 2011, containing articles onlibraries and book collections in Norway over the past 200 years. The main focus ofthis collection is the history of major public and university libraries of Norway.7

The National Library has been the core institution for organising a steady flow ofauthor jubilees in recent years. It started with a massive celebration of the centennialof the playwright Henrik Ibsen's death in 2006, and was followed by the anniversariesof, among others, the Nobel laureates Sigrid Undset (2007), Knut Hamsun (2009),and Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (2010), as well as the contemporary author Dag Solstad(2011). An important part of these celebrations was the production of bibliographies,led by The National Library. In keeping with the times, these bibliographies are

4 G. Dahl, Books in Early modern Norway. Leiden/Boston 2011. Dahl wrote her dissertationin history of religion on learned book collections in Norway in the seventeenth century:Questioning religious influence. Private libraries of clerics and physicians in Norway1650-1750. Bergen 2007. She has also published Book collections of clerics in Norway,1650-1750. Leiden/Boston 2010.

5 In 2002 Eide published a presentation of works in Norwegian book history between 1992and 2002: E. Eide, ‘Twenty years of the history of the book and of library history in Norway’,in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria 2 (2002), 286-316.

6 E. Eide, ‘Boksamlinger i Norge på 1800-tallet: laerde, leste, underholdende og dekorative’,in: S. Engelstad (ed.), Bokhistoriske foredrag. Oslo 2007, 18-25; ‘Bønder og bøker - opplystfolkelighet omkring år 1800’, in: Nytt norsk tidsskrift 16 (2009) 2, 141-152; ‘Opplysning,vitenskap og nasjonsbygging i fire store private boksamlinger på 1800-tallet’, in: R. Hemstad(ed.)Opplysning, vitenskap og nasjon. Bidrag til norsk bibliotekshistorie. Oslo 2011, 303-337.The article was published in English as ‘Reading societies and lending libraries innineteenth-century Norway’, in: Library & information history 26 (2010) 2, 121-38.

7 Hemstad, Opplysning, vitenskap og nasjon.


available online only.8 In the case of Ibsen, the bibliography includes both hisproduction and (printed)

8 Ibsen: www.nb.no/bibliografi/ibsen; Undset: www.nb.no/bibliografi/undset; Hamsun:www.nb.no/bibliografi/hamsun; Bjørnson: www.nb.no/bibliografi/bjornson; Solstad:www.nb.no/bibliografi/solstad.


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reception. The bibliographies have proved helpful for and popular with the generalpublic, students and scholars at home and abroad. As well as being important stepsin collecting and organising information about important authors, they have alsobeen instrumental in promoting these authors to a larger audience.

History of reading and literacy

Despite a lack of tradition of major libraries or book collections, Norway has a greattradition of reading and (as the bibliographies suggest) of writing. This could explainthe academic focus on literacy, reading practices and the book market, rather thanon the material book, in Norwegian book history.Partly due to the nation's Lutheran and pietistic traditions, after the Reformation

reading was regarded as essential to all subjects of the Dano-Norwegian king. Asthe Danish scholar Charlotte Appel has shown in her major work on reading inDenmark in the seventeenth century, literacy was widespread, even among lowersocial classes of society.9 This was further enhanced with the pietistic king ChristianVI's school law of 1739, which made learning to read compulsory for everyone, inorder for children to pass their confirmation. That reading was widespread in Norwaytoo, was documented by Jostein Fet in his detailed study of reading amongNorwegianpeasants before 1840, including inventories of peasants' privately owned books(1995).10 That writing, as well as reading, was a more common skill among ordinarypeople than had been acknowledged before was the conclusion of his next study(2003).11 While he estimates that in the eighteenth century about 80-90% of thepopulation could read to some extent, only 20-30% of the population could write.Fet's findings marked a shift in how historical literacy rates are estimated and his

findings have informed more recent studies in this area. Among them is Lis Byberg'sPhD dissertation (University College of Oslo and Akershus) on book auctions inNorway between 1750 and 1815 (2007).12 She concludes that members from all partsof society bought a broad spectre of books at these auctions, and that the readingcommunity was indeed much larger and more diverse than previously assumed. So,if this was the case, how did people acquire their reading skills, and how, where andby whom were people taught to read? Dagrun Skjelbred's (University College ofVestfold) most recent book (2010) traces how reading and writing was taught inNorwegian schools from the eighteenth century to this day.13 In her study, the materialbook (ABC books and readers) play an important role in uncovering teachingmethods.By analysing the typography,

9 Ch. Appel, Lasning og bogmarked i 1600-tallets Danmark. 2 vols., København 2001.10 J. Fet, Lesande bønder. Litteraer kultur i norske allmugesamfunn før 1840. Oslo 1995.11 J. Fet, Skrivande bønder. Skriftkultur på Nord-Vestlandet 1600-1850. Oslo 2003.12 L. Byberg,Brukte bøker til bymann og bonde. Bokauksjonen i den norske litteraere offentlighet

1750-1815. Oslo 2007. See also L. Byberg, ‘På sporet av 1700-tallets lesere’, in: Rem,Bokhistorie, 82-101.

13 D. Skjelbred, Fra Fadervår til Facebook. Skolens lese- og skriveopplaering i et historiskperspektiv. Bergen 2010.


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illustrations and formats, as well as content, the books reveal how teachingmethodologies changed through history.From the Reformation onwards, reading for religious purposes was the most

important factor in the increase of popular reading in Norway. In his work on thecritical edition of the Cathecismesange14 by the seventeenth-century national bard,the vicar Petter Dass from northern Norway, Jon Haarberg (University of Oslo) wasintrigued by the close link between religious songs, teaching, catechisms and reading.His work in this field runs parallel to the work of Charlotte Appel. Working on

material from the Norwegian seventeenth century also means studying the textualinterchange between manuscripts, transcripts and printed texts, as Dass' work wasnever printed in his lifetime, partly due to his geographical position in the peripheryof the periphery. An intimate knowledge of the material book, book market, transportand technology is indispensable for anyone working within textual criticism, perhapsparticularly with texts of this time and place.

Figure 2. Adolph Tidemand,Followers of Hans NielsenHauge (1856). Hauge's lay religiousmovementencouraged extensive reading, writing and printing among Norwegian peasants in the early nineteenthcentury. Oslo, Nasjonalmuseet

14 ‘Cathecism songs’, from about 1698. The oldest extant manuscript is currently owned bythe Petter Dass museum at Alstadhaug.


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Figure 3. The oldest surviving manuscript of Dass' Cathecismesange (1698), discovered by JonHaarberg in 2003. Photo: the Peter Dass Museum

In this scholarly crossroads of book history, religion and literacy we also findTrygve Riiser Gundersen (University of Oslo). He is currently writing his PhD thesison the religious dissident and lay preacher Hans Nielsen Hauge (1771-1824). Haugewrote and published large numbers of religious tracts and books, which helped forma major religious layman's movement in southern Norway.One of Riiser Gundersen's main points is that the print runs of his texts, totalling

hundreds of thousands of copies in a country with less than a million citizens,themselves bear witness to the extent of popular reading and literacy in the eighteenthand early nineteenth centuries. Lay religion became a new arena where ordinarypeople could write and publish despite being severely frowned upon, and evenpersecuted, by the authorities. A parallel phenomenon in Denmark was the pietisticHerrnhuts (the Moravian church), where members' reading and writing became coreactivities of the movement.


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The book market and reception studies

The histories of book collections and reading are closely related to studies of thebook market. A history of the Norwegian book trade was published in four volumesby Harald L. and Egil Tveterås (1936-1996)15 and in addition, somemajor publishinghouses have had their histories published.16 In recent years the interest in this areahas turned to the relationship between the Norwegian and the international market,particularly in the nineteenth century, when the book market was largely a commonDano-Norwegian market. For historical reasons, written Norwegian was very similarto Danish, so books published in Denmark were also sold on the Norwegian market(although not vice versa). During the second half of the century, major authors likeHenrik Ibsen, Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson and Knut Hamsun all published their bookswith Gyldendal in Copenhagen, who distributed them to Danish and Norwegian bookstores alike.The historian Narve Fulsås (University of Tromsø), working on the publishing

history of Henrik Ibsen's works, was astonished to find that the relatively small bookmarkets of Denmark and Norway could provide authors like Ibsen and Bjørnson witha very comfortable living, even compared to major European authors of the time.17

It is also remarkable how, over a few decades, the work of a number of Scandinavianauthors became world literature. When Ibsen became an internationally renownedauthor, and sold millions of copies of his dramas in Germany alone, it was still thehome market that provided him with his core income. The reasons for that werepartly international copyright laws, partly a difference between the home market(mainly bound books) and continental market (cheap paperback editions). A newresearch project led by Narve Fulsas is currently further investigating these findingsand the structure of the international European bookmarket in the nineteenth century.18

A project related to this thematically was Giuliano D'Amico's PhD dissertation(University of Oslo, 2011) on Ibsen's early reception in Italy.19 As Ibsen's plays wereimported into Italy by way of Germany, D'Amico's research included an attempt totrace the written and unwritten laws of the international European book market inlate nineteenth century. In addition, Tore Rem published a book on Ibsen's receptionin England

15 H.L. Tveteras, Den norske bokhandels historie. 4 vols., Oslo 1936-1996.16 Among them are: M. Egeland,Med kunnskap skal landet bygges. Universitetsforlaget

1950-1990. Oslo 1996; S. Evensmo, Gyldendal og gyldendøler. Oslo 1974; H.L. Tveterås,Et norsk kulturforlag gjennom hundre år. Aschehoug 1872-1972. Oslo 1972; B. Birkeland[et al.] (eds.), Det Norske Samlaget 1868-1968. Oslo 1968; C. Just, N.W. Damm & søn1843-1943. Et firmas historie. Oslo 1947.

17 Narve Fulsås' project was part of the major text critical project, Henrik Ibsen's writings (32vols., 2000-2010; e-edition: www.ibsen.uio.no). Fulsås edited and commented Ibsen's letters.For his introductions, containing his studies in Ibsen and the European book market, seewww.ibsen.uio.no/brevinnledninger or vols. 13-15 of the paper edition (in Norwegian onlyat the moment).

18 The project ‘Norges litteraere stormaktsperiode’ employs scholars in literature and history.The rise of major authors like Ibsen is studied in the light of the political and cultural contextsof the 1870s and 1880s, supplementing the traditional contexts of literature and history ofideas.

19 G. D'Amico,Domesticating Ibsen for Italy. Enrico and Icilio Polese's Ibsen campaign. Oslo2011.


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(2006).20 While this study is mainly a mapping of Ibsen's critical reception, Rem isnow preparing a study of how Ibsen was published and promoted in England. ADickens scholar, Rem has also published studies of Dickens' groundbreakingmethodsin publishing his novels in serials and promoting them to the public, as well as workingon the reception of Dickens' work in Norway.21 Rem's earlier publications include abook on the Norwegian author Alexander L. Kielland and the way he establishedhimself early on as a classic on the book market by being very conscious of how thematerial aspects of a book convey meaning.22

Figure 4. Letter from Ibsen to his German translator Julius Elias. Ibsen took an active part in regulatingthe publications and translations of his dramas in Europe. Photo: University of Oslo

The link between (international) reception and book market was also the topic formy own study of Norwegian editions of James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the

20 T. Rem, Henry Gibson/Henrik Ibsen. Den provinsielle verdensdikteren. Mottakelsen iStorbritannia 1872-1906. Oslo 2006.

21 See for instance his Dickens, melodrama, and the parodic imagination. New York 2002.22 T. Rem, Forfatterens strategier. Alexander Kielland og hans krets. Oslo 2002.


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Mohicans between 1826 and 1998 (2001). The development of the 300-page romanticepic turned children's book reflected not just the changed literary status of Cooper.It also reflected changes in literary tastes, local politics, structural developments inthe book market and its groups of readers, and how the text and its presentation wereshaped in keeping with the shifting trends.

Figure 5. ‘A Journey to the Moon, a fable’, attributed to Carl von Linné, printed 1769 in theintelligencer Adresseavisen in Trondheim. The fable journeyed from a Latin dissertation in Sweden,across Europe and North America by way of periodicals, returning to Scandinavia as a satire onacademic life. Photo: the National Library of Norway

The relationship between book market, reception and international circulation oftexts continue to be the topics for my recent and current studies, looking at theintersection of literature and the press. My dissertation (2007) on literature publishedin the first Norwegian newspapers (of the 1760s) presented a broad range of textspublished in these papers, originating from Persia to America. They includedeverything from classical to contemporary poems, or fables by Lessing to parts ofnovels by Voltaire. In my current project on eighteenth-century journals in the twinkingdom of Denmark-Norway, a main issue is the importance of the journal as amedium for the dissemination and circulation of literary texts and Enlightenmentideas. It was an important supplement


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and to some extent efficient competitor to the book. Both studies stress the closerelationship between book and periodical, in terms of texts, personnel, economy andtechnology, concluding that particularly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,these media cannot be studied separately.

The material book, technology and censorship

The National Library holds the major expertise on the material book andmanuscripts,with staff working in research, bibliography and conservation. Historian AnneEidsfeldt holds a position there in general book history, while Elisabeth Eide andEspen Karlsen are in charge of book history related to Norwegian and medieval textsrespectively. The Library has hosted seminars in book history for Scandinavianparticipants and is an important resource and partner for those who teach book historyin Oslo.Another important institution is The National Archive, especially when it comes

tomanuscripts. In 2007, its assistant director Knut Johannessen published a beautifullyillustrated and very helpful history of and guide to the gothic script as it was used inNorway up until the late nineteenth century.23 The book provides both a history ofwriting and an introduction to deciphering gothic script. A complementary newhistory of print in Norway comes from another archival employee, Tor Are Johansenat Arbeiderbevegelsens arkiv (The labour movement's archive). Johansen was oneof the authors behind the new history of the Norwegian press (2010),24 writing thechapters on print and technology. Even though the main topic is newsprint, his studyis really a groundbreaking investigation into the nation's general history of printtechnology and industry between 1760 and 1940.Recent publications on the material book include two on illustrations. Vilborg S.

Hovet (2011) traces the history of book illustrations in Norway, in a book itselfgenerously illustrated.25 It covers everything from illuminated manuscripts, the firstprinted almanacs and religious texts to the modern illustrations of artists such asEdvardMunch, Håkon Bleken and Pushwagner. Jahn Thon's work (2011, Universityof Agder) focuses on the relationship between text and illustration.26His study coverslearned books from and about Norway between 1625 and 1775, and how the imagesform and inform the content the books convey.Censorship has become a core subject to new studies in several disciplines,

including literature, media history and textual criticism. It is the topic for the Nordicconference in textual philology in 2013, held in Oslo. Studies in censorship are alsoincluded in a project on the history of Norwegian textual philology in the nineteenthand twenti-

23 K. Johannessen. Den glemte skriften. Gotisk håndskrift i Norge. Oslo 2007.24 H.F. Dahl (ed.), Norsk presses historie. Vols. 1-4, Oslo 2010. For an extended version of his

contribution see ‘Trangen til Laesning stiger, selv oppe i ultima Thule. Aviser ekspansjonog endring ca. 1763-1880’, in: Pressehistoriske skrifter 7 (2006), 7-119 and ‘Hett bly ograske presser. Teknologisk endring i norsk avisproduksjon 1880-1940’, in: Pressehistoriskeskrifter 9 (2007), 7-128.

25 V.S. Hovet, Den illustrerte boka. Historia om norsk bokillustrasjon. Oslo 2011.26 J. Thon, Talende linjer. Laerde illustrerte bøker 1625-1775. Oslo 2011.


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eth centuries, headed by Ståle Dingstad (University of Oslo). Censorship was notonly a phenomenon of World War II, but it also occurred in peace time. And whereto draw the line between editing and censoring, for instance when it comes to racialexpressions in old children's books?Aasta B. Bjarkøy addresses such questions and practices in her study, which is

part of the history of textual philology project. Censorship is also at the heart of acurrent project in media and book history, discussed below, called DiversifyingPublics and Opinions.

Related fields: Textual criticism/philology, media history and sociologyof literature

History of the book is intrinsically an interdisciplinary field of study. At the sametime, as this article suggests, a lot of interesting work is being done even in themargins of what is regarded as ‘core’ history of the book studies. Textual philologyand criticism is such a field, as well as media history. Sociology of literature isanother, to some extent overlapping with history of the book in certain areas. I willbriefly sketch some of the activities in these fields, as they have proved to be fruitfulto work in history of the book in Norway over the past few years.Asmentioned above, some of the new interests and projects in book history resulted

from the extensive text critical project Henrik Ibsen's writings. The project wasextensive in terms of funding, volume and scholarly effort, and in its scope andambition it raised the bar for critical editions in Norway, where such editions were(and still are) not a high priority. The project was based in Oslo, but it engagedscholars from universities and institutions all over the country. Particularly thecollaboration between historians, librarians and literary scholars allowed book historyand bibliography to open a common path to new insights into Ibsen's texts, his careerand his time. Also, when the paper edition was completed in 2010, a generation ofstudents and young scholars in Scandinavian literature had acquired skills in boththe scholarly and the technical challenges of modern textual criticism. This has provedvery valuable to the ongoing project of Ludvig Holberg's writings, a joint venturebetween the University of Bergen and the Danish Language and Literature Society.While the Ibsen project published everything both in book and electronic form, theHolberg project will publish mainly online, with only selected works in book form.27

The Norwegian Language and Literature Society follows suit, with a new online-onlyplatform for their critical editions of Norwegian classics.28

As the communities of philology and book history are small, several people takeactive part in both fields. This applies to the Scandinavian and Nordic communitiesas a whole, where collaborations across the borders occur frequently. The internationalinteraction, as well as the link between book history and philology, is reflected inthe

27 For the Holberg project, see gandalf.uib.no/Holberg (beta version). A few parts of the Ibsenproject have only been published online, like varia and scanned images of original manuscripts.

28 See www.bokselskap.no.


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topics for seminars held by the Nordic society for textual criticism, such as materialityand censorship.Media history has been revived as an interesting discipline, mainly due to the large

research and book project on the Norwegian history of the press, which culminatedin a four volume work in 2010. As mentioned above, Tor Are Johansen's and myown participation in that project contributed to a much needed strengthening of thelink between book and media history. I have since become a member of a newinterdisciplinary project, Diversifying Publics and Opinions, on Dano-Norwegianjournals in the eighteenth century. Censorship in the absolute monarchy and theperiodicals' role in debating, challenging and shaping the restricted public sphere arethe main subjects for the project, which is headed by the historian Mona R. Ringvej.An important aspect is placing this development in a broader European history ofmedia and ideas, as the periodicals were instrumental in the speedy transfer of textsand knowledge across borders. History of the book - technology and distribution,laws and regulations, history of reading, etcetera - is a major part of the project'scommon methodological ‘tool box’.29

While the sociology of literature has been an integral part of history of the bookin Sweden, in Norway the two areas have kept more of a distance. A major work inthis field is Trond Andreassen's Bok-Norge, an introduction to all aspects of booksand publishing in today's Norwegian society (authors, publishers, distribution,translators, criticism, laws and regulations, libraries and readers, and so on). It wasoriginally published in 1992, but the latest edition (2006) was entirely rewritten. Inthe revision, Andreassen was aided by University of Oslo students who did a bachelorin Litteraturformidling, a study which comprises elements of book history, sociologyof literature, philology and criticism. The combination of sociology of literature andbook history is also part of the curriculum for students of library and informationstudies (University College of Oslo and Akershus). A new book in sociology ofliterature, edited by Jofrid Karner Smith from this institution is currently under way.30

It will include articles with a book historical approach, as well as texts discussingthe relationship between the fields of book history and sociology of books.Last but not least, a recent interdisciplinary project at the University of Oslo called

‘Tekst/Historie’ brought together literary scholars and linguists in a collective effortto study the historicity of different kinds of texts. The goal was to study theinteractions of time, text and culture, and it resulted in the book Tekst og historie. Ålese tekster historisk.31 With chapters such as ‘the reader’, ‘the author’, ‘genre’ or‘materiality’, the authors use different methods, including a book historical approach,to engage in ‘historical’ readings of very different types of texts.

29 For more information on the project seewww.hf.uio.no/iakh/english/research/projects/diversifying/.

30 J. Karner Smith, Litteratursosiologiske perspektiver. Oslo 2013. Articles and introductionon book history are by Aina Nøding and Lis Byberg.

31 K. Asdal [et al.], Tekst og historie. Å lese tekster historisk. Oslo 2008.


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Future visions

What is interesting about book history in Norway in the past few years is that it hasdeveloped from being a subject for literary scholars only into a truly interdisciplinaryfield. That is enriching not only to the study of book history, but also to the respective‘mother’ disciplines, be it history or media sciences. Furthermore, there is a tendencyto move away from the study of reading or books from a national perspective only,to placing texts, authorships, technology, regulations or practices within aninternational or transnational context, be it Scandinavian, European or even larger.Still, the material studied tends to be national and local in origin. This is true forstudies in most other countries as well, as much research in book history starts withlocal book collections and archives. There is, however, a need for more internationalcomparative studies, and in that perspective, the Norwegian ‘case’ could well provea different and interesting one. The new project on Ibsen and the internationalpublishing history of his works is a case in point, as it highlights the differencesbetween the Scandinavian and the European book markets, and the roles they playedin forming Ibsen's career and international acclaim. The ongoing projects on theinternational circulation of printed texts, in books and periodicals, as well as projectson the history of reading will hopefully spur further research in these areas, researchthat opens up for new perspectives on the transnational aspects of Norwegian historyof print, books and reading.


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Archie L. DickBook history in South AfricaRecent developments and prospects

The history of the book has emerged as a productive site of inquiry and there havealready been several special issues of journals, a few chapters in books, a handful ofmonographs, and an anthology on South Africa's print, text, and book cultures. Bycomparison with book history in many countries this represents a growing but modestbody of work, and there is still no institutional home for research and tuitionprogrammes of book and print culture studies in South Africa. Plans for aresearch-driven Centre for the Book at the National Library of South Africa evaporatedwhen its focus became presentist and development-oriented in the 1990s. Nonetheless,between 2001 and 2009 scholarly contributions included a fewmonographs, an editedcollection of conference papers, and six special issues of South African academicjournals in the fields of English literature, history, and librarianship. This articlefocuses primarily on work that appeared between 2010 and 2012, and sketches brieflysome prospects for the future.

Recent developments

One of the advantages of not fixing the boundaries of book history in South Africais recent scholarship that connects unintentionally with this field of study. Thepublications discussed here therefore represent new work that benefits book historyin South Africa in different ways.Written culture in a colonial context: Africa andthe Americas, 1500-1900 links the evidence of writing with issues of social andcultural significance.1 Edited by Adrien Delmas and Nigel Penn, this collection bringstogether the histories of written culture and European expansion during the sixteenthto the nineteenth centuries. It lifts studies of literacy, writing, books, and readinginto the realms of transnational and interdisciplinary scholarship. Foregrounding thelargely overlooked regions of Africa and the Americas, some implications for bookhistory in South Africa and more general methodological challenges become evident.One of the editors calls attention to the material dimensions of writing not just as

1 A. Delmas, N. Penn (eds.),Written culture in a colonial context: Africa and the Americas,1500-1900. Cape Town 2011.


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the bedrock of historical studies but as a recent focus of cultural historians.2 The shiftfrom the idea of writing to that of inscription extended written cultures to includerock art, pictograms as well as oral performance as forms of proto-writing, breakingdown such dichotomies as ‘civility/barbarism’ and ‘writing/orality’. This now bringsseveral cultures, previously thought to have been without writing and studiedethnologically only, into the terrain of book history. The chapters dealing with SouthAfrica cover the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries in the Cape, Natal,and Transvaal regions. Related to this theme and also published in 2011,Decipheringancient minds: the mystery of San bushmen rock art by David Lewis-Williams andSam Challis examine an even earlier period.3 These scholars reveal how the analysisof rock paintings and engravings can produce key insights into San beliefs and patternsof thought. This is a little-known area of significance to all book historians.Lewis-Williams and Challis argue that the three registers of the Rosetta Stone findparallels in the study of San rock art. Their general approach, as that found inWrittenculture in a colonial context, resonate with transnationalism and cosmopolitanismas prominent features of South African book history.Isabel Hofmeyr shows in the context of Indian Ocean print cultures, for example,

that Gandhi's press in South Africa circulated print across the Indian Ocean and‘interpolated with cosmopolitanism in unexplored and interesting ways’.4 In doingso, she draws onMark Ravinder Frost's work on public spheres in Indian Ocean portcities in which the intellectual elite circulated periodicals to nurture universalismssuch as pan-Islam, pan-Buddhism, andHindu reformism.5 In a related article, Hofmeyrdiscusses transnational ideas of reading and theories of transnationalism moregenerally.6 She uses Gandhi's Hind Swaraj, which sets out his key ideas onnonviolence and civil disobedience, and which is essentially a dialogue between a‘Reader’ and an ‘Editor’ discussing how best British India should achieve home rule.Scholarly consensus is that the ‘Reader’ is an Indian extremist who wants to opposecolonial rule by force. In early prefaces of the book, which have now largelydisappeared from contemporary editions, Gandhi however views the ‘Reader’ as thereader of the newspaper Indian opinion that he edited in South Africa in the earlytwentieth century. Reinstating this South African reader in Gandhi's seminal text,Hofmeyr explores the possible implications of this ‘diasporic’ or ‘unlikely’ readeron Gandhi's thinking and on his ideas about Indian nationalism more generally.

2 A. Delmas, ‘Introduction: The written word and the world’, in: Delmas, Penn,Written culture,XX.

3 D. Lewis-Williams, S. Challis,Deciphering ancient minds: the mystery of San bushmen rockart. London 2011.

4 I. Hofmeyr, ‘Gandhi's printing press: Indian Ocean print cultures and cosmopolitanisms’,in: I. Hofmeyr, M. Williams (eds.), South Africa and India: shaping the global south.Johannesburg 2011, 10.

5 M.R. Frost, ‘That great ocean of idealism: the Tagore circle and the idea of Asia, 1900-1920’,in: A. Jamal, S. Moorthy (eds.), Indian Ocean studies: cultural, social and politicalperspectives. New York 2009; M.R. Frost, ‘To Durban via Singapore and other colonialport-cities: an historical journey across the Indian Ocean in search of cosmopolitanism,1869-1919’, in: P. Gupta [et al.] (eds.), Eyes across the water: navigating the Indian Ocean.New Delhi 2009.

6 I. Hofmeyr, ‘Violent texts, vulnerable readers: Hind Swaraj and its South African audiences’,in: Public culture: an interdisciplinary journal of transnational cultural studies 23 (2011),285-297.


Tracing even earlier transnational elements in South Africa's book history, AchmatDavids identifies one source of the Afrikaans language to the Cape Muslims whohad their origins in South East Asia and the Indian Ocean rim.7 The Afrikaans of theCape

7 A. Davids, The Afrikaans of the Cape Muslims from 1815 to 1915. Ed. H. Willemse, S.E.Dangor. Pretoria 2011.


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Muslims from 1815 to 1915 overturns the view that Afrikaans was a ‘Europeantransplantation’ that ‘developed gradually out of Dutch dialects’.8 This Englishtranslation of Davids' originalMasters degree dissertation shows that the recognitionof Afrikaans as a ‘separate’ language was thanks to ‘a group of men from Paarl inthe Western Cape who in the late nineteenth century attempted to broaden thefunctional uses of Afrikaans’ in what became the so-called ‘First Afrikaans LanguageMovement’.9

One of Davids' main objectives was to create a standard system of transliteratingthe Arabic script of Arabic-Afrikaans texts into roman script to demonstrate that theCape Muslim community wrote as they spoke. This demonstrates thatArabic-Afrikaans texts are similar to audio-recordings, and that they preserved theoriginal sounds ofMuslimAfrikaans. Davids shows howMuslimAfrikaans speakersadapted the Arabic alphabet and Muslim ‘rules of reading’ to preserve their ownunique sounds.He achieved this through a system of transliteration that could produce the actual

sounds of past speakers. This translation comes more than twenty years after Davidscompleted his research, and Gerald Groenewald suggests that he was actually an‘early South African practitioner of what is now called “book history”’.10

Figure 1. Early Muslim prayer book. Cape Family Research Forum; courtesy of Shamiel Gamildien

8 G. Groenewald, ‘Review of A. Davids The Afrikaans of the Cape Muslims from 1815 to1915. Ed. H. Willemse, S.E. Dangor. Pretoria 2011’. In: New Contree 62 (2011), 182.

9 Groenewald, ‘Review of A. Davids’, 182-183.10 Ibidem, 185.


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Figure 2.Muslim school: boys learning to read the Koran. FromGeorge F. Angas, The Kafirs illustratedin a series of drawings taken among the Amazulu, Amaponda, and Amakosa tribes, 1822-1886. London1849, 9. Courtesy of Kimberley Africana Library, Kimberley

The translation of Davids' dissertation into English comes fortuitously for bookhistory in South Africa when jawi (Arabic-Malay) and Arabic-Afrikaans texts arebeing analysed in greater detail. Saarah Jappie explains that these texts weretranslations of Arabic literature into the vernacularMalay and Cape Dutch languagesusing the Arabic script to ensure that they could be easily read by worshippers andlearners.11 Copies of the texts are called ajami manuscripts to indicate that Arabicscript is used to write in another language. The earliest ajamimanuscripts were calledjawiwhen theMalay language was widely used at the Cape, and from 1826 the ajamimanuscripts appeared in the Dutch-Afrikaans language.Following Davids' cue, Jappie emphasises the broader social and historical contexts

of the manuscripts instead of philological methods that focus primarily on theircontent. She shows how the manuscripts are ‘objects with dynamic lives, accruinghistory and taking on different social functions as the contexts around them develop’.12

11 S. Jappie, ‘From the Madrasah to the Museum: The Social Life of the Kietaabs of CapeTown’, in: History in Africa 38 (2011), 369-399; S. Jappie, ‘Jawi Dari Jauh: “Malays” inSouth Africa through Text’, in: Indonesia and the Malay World 40 (2012), 143-159.

12 Jappie, ‘From the Madrasah to the Museum’, 374.


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Demonstrating this approach, she traces the roles of the manuscripts and kietaabs(books) from their ‘lives’ as practical objects in the educational, medicinal, andcommunicative practices of the early Cape Muslim community to their use today inheritage, identity, and genealogical projects.The study of the CapeMuslim ajamimanuscripts is part of the larger Tombouctou

Manuscripts Project and an African ajami network that includes experts from Mali,Nigeria, Ethiopia, Niger, South Africa, Poland, and Norway.13

Figure 3. Slave reading a ‘kitaab’ (book). Detail of the author's portrait in François Valentijn, Ouden nieuw Oost-Indiën, vervattende een naaukeurige en uitvoerige verhandelinge van Nederlandsmogentheyd in die gewesten. Dordrecht, by Johannes van Braam, Amsterdam, by Gerard onder deLinden, 1724. Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague

South African historian Shamiel Jeppie, for example, recently analysed MalianIslamic scholar Bularaf's personal archive. Bularaf was born in 1864 in south-westernMorocco, but by 1907 he established himself in Timbuktu and started his archiverepository. He had a place for copyists and for checking copies, and a unit for makingcovers for the loose leaves of writing.14 He made space for copyists to work with anoriginal

13 Projects available at: www.tombouctoumanuscripts.org/projects/, accessed 26 October 2012.14 S. Jeppie, ‘History for Timbuktu: Ahmad Bul'aräf, archives and the place of the past’, in:

History in Africa 38 (2011), 401-416.


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beside them while copying onto a blank page. He not only paid for the paper, pens,and ink but also the copyists for their travel costs and sometimes the owners forlending the originals. Bularaf had no aversion to printing and in fact arranged forseveral books to be printed. Printing itself had been around since the French colonialpresence in the region a century earlier. As a copyist himself, Bularaf added his owninterpellations in texts when it involved the region whose local conditions he knewbetter. These practices, albeit locally distinctive, resonatedwith wider Islamic ‘culturesof scholarship’.15 The protection from destruction of the Timbuktu manuscripts hasre-emerged as a critical concern for scholars in the light of the unstable politicalsituation in Mali and the North African region more generally.16

Also linking book history concerns with present-day culture and politics, AshwinDesai's Reading revolution: Shakespeare on Robben Island17 comes crucially at atime when textbooks and libraries are being destroyed in South Africa.18 As asociologist he may not view his work as book history, but it actually progresses thefield by showing how we can connect the past with the present, and it links printculture with political critique. By the time that apartheid was unravelling, politicalprisoners had turned Robben Island prison into a university and a library. Many whoarrived as illiterates and left as book collectors often left behind some of their ownliterary treasures to fan the fires of the reading revolution they had started. Desaisamples prisoners who signed off on their favourite passages from prisoner SonnyVenkatrathnam's disguised copy ofWilliam Shakespeare: the complete works beforehe was released. He weaves a compelling narrative about Shakespeare's receptionand audiences on the island, and about reading more generally in apartheid's mostforbidding jail. An attractive feature is the range of Shakespearian genres, forms,and themes fromwhich prisoners, representing a range of anti-apartheid organisations,selected their favourite passages.These passages provide a springboard into each prisoner's personal journey as a

reader. They also encapsulate an aspect of his character and political outlook. Desaifollows some of the readers after their release from Robben Island prison and intotheir post-1994 lives. This feature gives the book its special significance. Inequalitiesin the new South Africa's education system, which Desai attributes to poor economicchoices and political compromises, have left some of the reading revolutionariesdisillusioned. Others seek to re-ignite the revolutionary spark of Robben Islandthrough reading programmes in poverty-stricken townships.

15 Jeppie, ‘History for Timbuktu’, 413-414.16 Although the library of the Ahmed Baba Institute of Higher Learning and Islamic Research

was burned down in Mali in late January 2013, most of the manuscripts had already beenremoved earlier and were saved from destruction, See: ‘People of Timbuktu save manuscriptsfrom invaders’. Available at:bigstory.ap.org/article/people-timbuktu-save-manuscripts-invaders (accessed 16 February2013).

17 A. Desai, Reading revolution: Shakespeare on Robben Island. Pretoria 2012.18 ‘Public protector looking into destruction of Limpopo textbooks’. Available at:

www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=177135 (accessed 30 July 2012); for theburning of libraries, see: ‘Book burnings in South Africa’. Available at:www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=357815&sn=Detail&pid=71619(accessed 16 February 2013).


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Uncovering book and reading cultures like those of the Robben Island politicalprisoners is the theme of Archie Dick's The hidden history of South Africa's bookand reading cultures.19 Dick shows how book and reading cultures in South Africa'spast emerged, survived or even thrived ‘despite the ways in which controlling andrepressive regimes have sought to destroy or limit the impact of reading and writingfor their own purposes’.20 Despite the widely-held belief that there is either a poorreading culture or none at all, this book demonstrates that ordinary South Africanshave always read and wrote. By looking at junctures in South Africa's history wefind examples of common readers and writers among Cape slaves, free blacks, andmission-based workers in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Ordinary readersand writers were active also in the twentieth century among school learners, soldiers,Soweto exiles, community activists, and political prisoners. They often read in waysthat defied the strategies of elites and authorities that sought to control what theyread. Contestations about what, where, and how to read led to acts of censorship,book burning, book theft, and subversive reading and writing. Surprising discoveriesinclude the earliest official statistics of working class literacy, and the popularity ofCharles Dickens across South Africa's class, colour, and political divisions.The case studies in Dick's book suggest that many gaps in South African book

history remain. Elizabeth le Roux's work both identifies and closes some of thesegaps. Her literature reviews of print culture and book history studies in South Africaand Africa more generally are comprehensive, and she has undertaken the first studyof the country's university presses during the apartheid period. Recognising the needfor foundational texts, she mapped the growth of book history in South Africa.21 Ofthe work on the African continent that Le Roux has been able to track down muchis still descriptive, although some theoretical models have emerged in the past decade.Her overview presents ‘a sampling of the most significant work’ that also highlightsrecent trends.22

Le Roux has looked also at aspects of scholarly publishing in South Africa,23 buther work on the university presses in the colonial and apartheid periods fills a gapin the country's book and publishing history. Of the roles played by university pressesin the apartheid era, she notes that they were ‘neither clearly anti-apartheid, nor neatlycollaborationist’.24 University presses, she argues, can reveal much about academicfreedom in an oppressive society, and about how they relate to political shifts. Le

19 A.L. Dick, The hidden history of South Africa's book and reading cultures. Toronto 2012.20 C. van Onselen, ‘Review of The hidden history of South Africa's book and reading cultures

by Archie Dick. Toronto: University of Toronto Press’, in:Quarterly bulletin of the NationalLibrary of South Africa 66 (2012), 41.

21 E. le Roux, ‘The accidental growth of book history: a literature review of print culture andbook history studies in South Africa’, in:Mousaion 30 (2012), 1.

22 E. le Roux, ‘Book history in the African world: the state of the discipline’, in: Book history15 (2012), 248-300.

23 E. le Roux, ‘The “politics” and practice of peer review in South Africa’, in: S. Ngobeni (ed.),Scholarly publishing in Africa: opportunities and impediments. Pretoria 2010, 315-326; E.le Roux, ‘Does the North read the South? The case of South African scholarly publishers’,in: B. Benwell [et al.] (eds.), Postcolonial audiences: readers, viewers and reception. Oxford2012, 73-85.

24 E. le Roux, ‘The university as publisher: towards a history of South African universitypresses’, in: A. van der Vlies (ed.),Print, text and book cultures in South Africa. Johannesburg,437.


Roux critiques the Oxford University Press model that guided the early developmentof South


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African university presses, which largely promoted the academic and research aimsof the universities they served. A trenchant analysis of Oxford University Press itselfduring the apartheid period comes fromCaroline Davis. She explains how it sacrificedits liberal outlook to secure its commercial position when it came increasingly todepend on profits from the ‘publication of Bantu Education approved texts, whichled to an avoidance of the publication of “controversial” or anti-apartheid texts’.25

Bringing together similar case studies and overviews of book history in SouthAfrica is Andrew van der Vlies's anthology Print, text, and book cultures in SouthAfrica.26 His introductory essay systematically maps the conceptual terrain of thefield of study and demonstrates its relevance to South Africa's literary and culturalhistory.27 Including contributions from prominent scholars in English and Africanliterature, history, librarianship and publishing studies, it offers revisions of previouslypublished work, as well as new essays covering topics on colonial and missionaryprint cultures, orature and the image of the book in autochthonous languages, bookcollections, transnational histories of the book, print and circulation, censorship, andthe politics of educational publishing. Effectively, this collection takes the measureof book history scholarship in South Africa and may become a primer for students.Novelty, interdisciplinarity, relevance to public policy, and an awareness of its

location in Africa appear therefore to characterise South Africa's modest book historyprofile. Some of these qualities already distinguished the failed effort by SouthAfrican writer J.M. Coetzee to start ‘The book in Africa’ course in 1980 forundergraduate students at the University of Cape Town. Peter McDonald explainsthat this specialist option in the African Literature programme planned to explore‘environmental pressures of all kinds on writers, the economics of publishing anddistributing literary works, [and] the nature of the readership of literary works’, andthat the course would require ‘a certain amount of bibliographical ferreting and acertain amount of practical investigative research’.28 Some of the practical workrequired students to locate bookshops in the Cape Peninsula and libraries in the blacktownships. They would also investigate small literary magazines, the practices ofapartheid censors, the Heinemann African Writers series, and compare themes andthe readers of West African Onitsha market literature and South Africa'sphoto-novels.29 One can only speculate what book history in South Africa may havelooked like today had more than just one student enrolled for Coetzee's course.What is evident though is that South African and non-South African scholars are

actually investigating some of the themes on Coetzee's course list. The UnitedStates-based scholar Lily Saint, for example, has investigated the reading of ‘Western’or cow-

25 C. Davis, ‘Histories of publishing under apartheid: Oxford University Press in South Africa’,in: Journal of Southern African studies 37 (2011), 79.

26 Van der Vlies, Print, text, and book cultures in South Africa.27 Ibidem, 16-48.28 P. McDonald, ‘The book in South Africa’, in: D. Atwell, D. Attridge (eds.), The Cambridge

history of South African literature. Cambridge 2012, 800.29 Ibidem.


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boy photo-comics of the middle and late apartheid periods. She claims that ‘narrativeand aesthetic conventions of the form reinforced yet simultaneously disturbed theapartheid state's fantasy of total segregation.’30 Moreover, through reading practicesblack and white South Africans could have contact in the ‘imaginative and affectivespheres even while apartheid doctrine attempted to prevent it.’31 Photo-comics weretherefore not just distracting and ‘light’ reading; they also functioned politically.More recently, Saint has looked at the notorious apartheid passbooks as books,examining the ways in which they ‘narrated lives and conditioned various politicaland racial modes of subjectivity’.32 Using literary and other techniques, she arguesthat despite the aims of controlling the everyday lives of South Africans, passbooksactually failed to do so in ways that apartheid authorities intended.Had Coetzee's course flourished in the 1980s, there may have been more South

African literary scholars doing book history today. That they are now starting torecognise its value is perhaps best expressed by Sarah Duff who notes in a reviewof Van der Vlies' collection that ‘when literary analysis is grounded in anunderstanding of the material circumstances in which texts are produced, it has thepotential to shed light on the ways in which books and other publications areimplicated in the creation of identities, and in the production and maintenance ofpower’.33 She insists, however, that book historians should include popular forms ofpublishing and popular fiction or risk ‘a tiny and elite print and book culture in SouthAfrica’.

Prospects

Book history in South Africa is in its early phase of development, but the prospectsfor growth are good. Some departments of history, literature, and publishing studiesat universities feature book history themes as special topics, but these initiatives aredriven by individuals instead of being curriculum-based. The number of South Africanscholars working both self-consciously and ‘accidentally’ in this field is growing,and collaboration with book history scholars abroad has strengthened internationalresearch networks. A recent example is Print, publishing, and cultural productionin South Africa, 1948-2012, which is a British Academy research project fundedunder the International Partnership and Mobility Scheme 2012-13.34 This projectestablishes a long-term research partnership between the Oxford International Centrefor Publishing Studies at Oxford Brookes University and the Publishing Studies

30 L. Saint, ‘Not western: race, reading and the South African photocomic’, in: Journal ofSouthern African studies 36 (2010), 939.

31 Ibidem.32 L. Saint, ‘Reading subjects: passbooks, literature and apartheid’, in: Social dynamics 38

(2012), 117-133.33 S.E. Duff, ‘Reviews: on the matter of books’. Available at:

www.slipnet.co.za/view/reviews/review-print-text-and-book-cultures-in-south-africa-andrew-van-der-vlies-editor-by-sarah-emily-duff/(accessed 31 January 2013).

34 For more information, see:www.publishing.brookes.ac.uk/research/project/print-publishing-and-cultural-production-in-south-africa/.


programme at the University of Pretoria. It examines the production, disseminationand


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reception of the book in South Africa, with a special focus on the role of print culturein constituting national identities during the apartheid and post-apartheid periods.The programme included participation in ‘The book in Africa’, an InternationalSymposium held on 20 October 2012 at the Institute for English Studies, SenateHouse, University of London, and a research visit by Archie Dick and Beth le Rouxto the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies. Caroline Davis and SarahHughes will visit the University of Pretoria in May 2013.The most significant step forward for book history in South Africa would be a

teaching programme at a research-intensive university, or a research centre thatfocuses on book history and/or print and digital cultures. Another way forward wouldbe to connect South Africa's manuscript, book and print culture scholars to existingcentres or projects in Africa with broader but germane research themes. Onepossibility is the Africa Codicology Institute, but its website has been underconstruction for some time and therefore remains elusive. A more likely possibilitymay be the Timbuktu Manuscripts Project located with the Institute of Humanitiesin Africa (HUMA) at the University of Cape Town. The TimbuktuManuscripts Project,or the South Africa-Mali Timbuktu Manuscripts Project, was officially launched in2003.35 A major achievement of this project was the new library-archive building,which was inaugurated in Timbuktu in January 2009. The project is dedicated toresearch various aspects of writing and reading the handwritten works of Timbuktuand beyond. Training young researchers is an integral part of its work. This projectincludes a sub-project on ‘Book history in Africa’, and provides an opportunity forstrengthening the transnational outlook of South African book history.The prospects for a more stable growth path for book history is kept alive also in

a seminar series arranged as a partnership between the Institut Francais d'Afrique duSud (IFAS) and the Department of Information Science at the University of Pretoria.The seminar series will involve the cooperation of scholars from the University ofCape Town, Wits University, and the University of Johannesburg. Internationalspeakers will feature in the seminars that will take place once a month, alternatingbetween IFAS and the University of Pretoria.36 What is therefore certain is that theinterest in book history is deeper and the circle of scholars is wider. The next phaseof development will establish book history's place on the map of South African andinternational scholarship.

35 For more information, see: www.tombouctoumanuscripts.org/.36 For more information, see: www.ifas.org.za/research/.


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Anders ToftgaardPrincely libraries, the readings of common man and the entry of thebook cover into literary studiesTrends in book history research in Denmark

Book history is often claimed to be a new discipline, taking its starting point fromthe publications of Roger Chartier and Robert Darnton from the 1980s. But it hasbeen in existence in libraries since the nineteenth century, and Chartier and Darntonrevitalised a discipline that had been part of library studies and turned it into anacademic discipline with more general applications.1

It might be argued that in a Danish context book history takes its beginning withthe Danish eighteenth-century antiquarians.2 The Danish word boghistorie firstappeared, however, in 1861 when it was suggested as a Danish equivalent of theforeign word bibliography.3 In the first Danish-language introduction to librarystudies, published in 1912, book history - in a wider sense - was defined as a specificfield within the field of library studies. The book was edited by the 25-year-oldlibrarian Svend Dahl (1887-1963), the future national librarian. In his preface to thehandbook, the director of The Royal Library H.O. Lange (1863-1943), claimed that‘Book history, bibliography and library history should be cultivated with specialaffection by librarians’.4 Later, in an article on book history published in theScandinavian successor to the handbook, Nordisk leksikon for bogvaesen, SvendDahl defined book history as follows:

In contrast to literary history which deals with the spiritual content ofbooks and their authors' contribution to the history of thought, the historyof books comprises the historical development of the book as a materialobject, its outer form, its manufacture and equipment, the history of paperand other writing materials, the development of writing, printing andillustration and the history of bookbinding. To this may further be addedthe various ages' forms of

1 I wish to thank Ivan Boserup, Susanne Budde, Karsten Christensen, Erik Petersen and KarenSkovgaard-Petersen for their comments on various versions of the present article. Anyshortcomings are my responsibility alone.

2 On Danish book history in the nineteenth century see H. Horstbøll, ‘A survey of the historyof the book and libraries in Denmark since 1990’, in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- ochbibliotekshistoria 86 (2002), 2, 165-203. See also S. Bruhns, Bibliografiens historie iDanmark, 1700- og 1800-tallet. Aalborg 2004.

3 H.P. Selmer, Om de i det danske sprog forekommende fremmede ord, III:Fremmed-afløsnings-ordbog. København 1861, 86.

4 H.O. Lange, ‘Forord’, in: S. Dahl (ed.), Haandbog i bibliotekskundskab. København 1912,3.


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both book diffusion (book sellers and book auctions) and book collecting(libraries, bibliophily). There is a rich literature on the history of the book,but predominantly on the individual branches of it; the history of theprinting press has been treated in particular detail.5

He then goes on citing books that cover the history of the book in a holistic way,among others his own Bogens historie, based upon lectures at the Royal School ofLibrarianship, published in 1927 and later revised (1957), translated and reprinted(1970). In the preface, Dahl expresses his wish for a holistic approach to the historyof the book:

Most of the existing works on the history of the book present its variousphases: manuscripts, printing, binding, illustration, the book-trade andlibraries separately. In this work I have attempted to present them all in aunified account so that their interrelationship will become apparent andthe history of the book will appear in perspective as an essential factor inthe history of culture.6

In Dahl's description of the various parts of the history of the book, there is only oneimportant domain of ‘modern’ book history which is not included, and that is thequestion of reading and literacy. As we will see, this particular field has beenaddressed in recent years in Danish research in book history.In the following, I will give an overview of the state of affairs in the field of book

history studies in Denmark. Let me start by pointing out that there are excellentbibliographical surveys of the literature on the history of the book in Denmark in theperiod from 1950 to 2005. In 1992 Ingrid Ilsøe published a survey of literature onthe history of the book in Denmark from 1950 to 1990, based upon an earlier articlein English covering the period from 1950 to 1985.7 In 2006, Henrik Horstbøllpublished a survey of the history of the book and libraries in Denmark in the periodfrom 1990 to 2005. It was issued with similar surveys of the other Nordic countriesin Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria.8 In the present article Iconsequently wish to point to current trends in book historical research in Denmark.The article will cover the period from 2005, but in some cases it is useful or necessaryto go back to the end of the 1990s. I will focus on research dealing with the historyof the book in Denmark in the era of the printed book, and especially on researchthat consciously addresses the field of book history. Palaeography and medievalstudies are not dealt with here and I will not address library history as such. The

5 S. Dahl, ‘Boghistorie’, in: P. Birkelund [et al.] (eds.), Nordisk leksikon for bogvaesen.København/Oslo/Stockholm 1951-1962, vol. 1, 153 (my translation).

6 S. Dahl, History of the book. New York 1958, iii. The translation renders thecorresponding paragraph in the Danish edition from 1927 quite well.

7 I. Ilsøe, ‘Litteratur om dansk bogvaesen trykt 1950-1990. Tryk, bind og boghandel ca.1482-1920’, in: Fund og forskning 31 (1992), 143-198. The article was a revised version ofan article published in Gutenberg-Jahrbuch: ‘Printing, book illustration, bookbinding, andbook trade in Denmark, 1482-1914. A survey of the most important contributions to thehistory of the Danish book during the last 35 years’, in: Gutenberg-Jahrbuch 60 (1985),258-80.

8 H. Horstbøll, ‘A survey of the history of the book and libraries in Denmark since 1990’, in:Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria 86 (2006) 2, 165-203.


definition of book history underlying this article is thus narrower than the oneformulated by Dahl.


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Journals

Henrik Horstbøll published his survey of the history of the book and libraries inDenmark in 2006 in what proved to be the antepenultimate issue of the journalNordisk tidskrift för bok- och bibliotekshistoria. This journal was founded asNordisktidskrift för bok- och biblioteksväsen in 1914 and published for the last time in 1996.In the new millennium it was briefly resuscitated by a consortium of Scandinaviannational libraries under the slightly changed title Nordisk tidskrift för bok- ochbibliotekshistoria but it did not last long.From 1986 to 2004, the journal Grafiana was published by the Danish Museum

of the Graphical Industries - now TheMediaMuseum. Instead of publishing journals,the museum now sends out a newsletter by email. It also publishes small books onthe history of modern printing in Denmark.9 Bogens verden (The world of the book)was founded in 1906 and its publication was terminated by the end of 2011. Rotundenwas a periodical published by the State Library in Århus dedicated to research in itscollections which stopped appearing in 2009.Some book historical journals are, however, still being published. Bogvennen (‘the

friend of books’) has been issued by the Association for Book Craftsmanship since1890. The journal has in recent years published special issues with a certain emphasison book history.10 The Association for Book Craftsmanship also publishes thequarterly newsletterNyt for bogvenner,11 and it organises a yearly exhibition of bookcraftsmanship with a catalogue.Fund og forskning i Det Kongelige Biblioteks samlinger is the annual research

journal published by The Royal Library. Magasin fra Det Kongelige Bibliotek is aquarterly popular journal published by The Royal Library which also prints originalresearch. Bibliotekshistorie is a journal dedicated to library history, published atirregular intervals by Dansk Bibliotekshistorisk Selskab.12 Care and conservation ofmanuscripts publishes papers from the conferences of the same name; so far twelvevolumes have been published.

Institutions

There is no chair in book history at any university in Denmark, but occasionallycourses in book history are taught in Danish universities. In 2010 the Royal Schoolof Librarianship changed its name in Danish into Det Informationsvidenskabelige

9 Such as B.H.G. Ditzel,Maskinsaetteren. Odense 2009; C.P. Clausen Buch, Levnedsskildring.Bogtrykker C.P. Clausen Buch. Odense 2010.

10 Bogvennen 2011-2012 was about Danish book collectors of the twentieth century. In 2013all volumes of Bogvennen will be made available at www.tidsskrift.dk.

11 See: www.boghaandvaerk.dk/Aktuelt.htm.12 The three journals are available at www.tidsskrift.dk.


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Akademi, IVA (‘Royal School of Library and Information Science’). Part of theresearch in book history at IVA has in recent years been relocated within the field ofinformation studies. The printing presses of the Laboratory of book history havebeen transferred to the Royal Academy of Arts, and book history is no longer a partof the research profile of IVA, but at the Master level students can follow a course in‘The Book - its history and materiality’. In January 2013 IVA merged with theUniversity of Copenhagen.

Figure 1. An exhibition of the Treasures of The Royal Library staged by Russian artist Andrey Bartenevand edited by Bruno Svindborg and Anders Toftgaard opened in May 2012 in the Montana Hall.Photo: Th. Trane Petersen, The Royal Library

The Royal Library is a key player in the field of the history of the book - sometimesaccused of being too attached to traditional bibliography. It holds important historicalbook collections, it publishes journals in book history and it organises exhibitionsand an annual conference dedicated to the history of the book.

The Royal Library's director, Erland Kolding Nielsen, is the editor-in-chief of theseries Danish Humanist Texts and Studies. Kolding Nielsen is also president of theAssociation for Book Craftsmanship,13 which was founded in 1888 and traditionallyunites the book business with the library world. Recent years have witnessed jointpublications by The Royal Library and the association, such as the book Alle tiderstryk about the library's collection of pamphlets and corporate publications.14

13 A Festschrift to Erland Kolding Nielsen was published in 2007, with many articles on bookhistory: J.T. Lauridsen, O. Olsen (eds.) Umisteligt. Festskrift til Erland Kolding Nielsen.København 2007.

14 T. Høeg Jacobsen [et al.], Alle tiders tryk. Småtrykssamlingen i Det Kongelige Bibliotek.København 2010.


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The Danish bibliophile association Dansk Bibliofil-Klub was founded in 1942. Itpublishes books and catalogues of its exhibitions and its members edited the recentcatalogue of twentieth-century Danish book collectors.15

International Cooperation

There are long lasting traditions of cooperation between the Scandinavian countriesin book history. In 2007 Charlotte Appel and Karen Skovgaard-Petersen initiated anetwork for Scandinavian book historians. At a conference in the beginning of 2008they proposed the creation of an internet portal dedicated to the history of the bookin Scandinavia,16 for which the Dutch Bibliopolis served as a model.17 At theconference, Marieke van Delft from the Koninklijke Bibliotheek in The Hague gavean introduction to that website. Since then, both Appel and Skovgaard-Petersen havebeen appointed to new positions, and the conferences were not followed up, but thenetwork did serve for cooperation on the Oxford Companion to the book.Instead a Nordic Forum for Book history was created, which organises two annual

conferences, and with its 200 members is a lively forum for discussions in bookhistory.18 Themain partners in the forum are the universities of Lund and Copenhagen;in fact, the forum is mostly a Danish-Swedish cooperation. It has close ties withDanish and Swedish libraries.In 2010 Horstbøll and Lundblad edited a volume of Lychnos, the journal published

by the Swedish society Lärdomshistoriska samfundet, on book history to whichseveral of the network's members contributed.19 Many of the members of the NordicForum for Book history are also members of SHARP, the international Society for theHistory of Authorship, Reading, and Publishing. In 2012 Simon Frost - who is amember of SHARP'S executive committee - published the book The business of thenovel. Economics, aesthetics and the case of Middlemarch.20Both Frost and Robert Rix participated in the organisation of the SHARP conference

‘PublishedWords, Public Pages’ which was held at Copenhagen in September 2008.21

They co-edited a collection of essays,Moveable type, mobile nations. Interactionsin transnational book history.22 In the book, the contribution of the English-speakingworld to the flow of books in smaller countries is explored. At the University ofSouthern Denmark, Frost was a member of the research group ‘The GutenbergParenthesis’, headed by Lars

15 Bogvennen 2011-2012/Danske bogsamlere i det 20. århundrede. 2 vols., København 2012.16 Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Årsberetning 2008, 86-88. Newsletter from the Manuscripts

Department at The Royal Library, January 2008:www.kb.dk/da/kb/nb/ha/center/nyhedsbrev1-2008.html#3.

17 See www.bibliopolis.nl.18 Its main forum is the blog nffb.wordpress.com.19 Available online: www.vethist.idehist.uu.se/lychnos/index.php?view=book&book=2010.20 S. Frost. The business of the novel: economics, aesthetics and the case of Middlemarch.

London 2012.21 S. Frost, ‘Introduction to SHARP Copenhagen: a Nordic conference of international print

culture’, in: Library & information history 25, 3 (Sept. 2009), 171-173.22 S. Frost, R.W. Rix (eds.):Moveable type, mobile nations: interactions in transnational book

history. København 2010.


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Ole Sauerberg. Among the results of the group are four book historical articles in aspecial issue of the journal Orbis litterarum.23 At Aarhus University, in november2010, the international seminar ‘Media in Transition. The Book as Concept and inUse from Manuscript to Print’ took place.Several Danish scholars are members of a Nordic network for text editors,24 founded

in 1995.25 The network has organised annual conferences on editorial philology andsince 1999 it has published its own series. The latest issue, dedicated to the materialityof the book, book history and bibliography, was published in 2009.26 The networkhas built upon and informed the editions of the works of the great Scandinavianclassics published over the last years. Søren Kierkegaard's collected works have beenpublished both in print and online,27 Ludvig Holberg's works are being published inprint and online,28 and the works of N.F.S. Grundtvig are being published online.29

Book historians have been working on these editions and their work has yieldedseveral studies.30 Recently Johnny Kondrup published a handbook in textualscholarship, which to a certain extent also serves as an introduction to bibliography.31

Danish scholars also participate in the European Society for Textual Scholarship andhave published articles in its journal Variants.32

Book historical research has benefited from a comparative and transnationalapproach. The ethnologist Jürgen Beyer, who in the years 2008-2010 was an associateprofessor at the University of Copenhagen, wrote an article on printers' and publishersaddresses in eighteenth-century books, including Danish books.33 In January 2012,Wolfgang Undorf defended his doctoral dissertation From Gutenberg to Luther.

23 Orbis litterarum 64 (2009) 2. See also: P. Simonsen, ‘Italic typography and Wordsworth'slater sonnets as visual poetry’, in: Studies in English literature 1500-1900 47 (2007) 4,863-880, and id.,Wordsworth and word-preserving arts. Typographic inscription, ekphrasisand posterity in the later work. Basingstoke 2007.

24 See: nnedit.org.25 For the history, see K. Steen Ravn, ‘The academic status of editorial history and editorial

philology. Conference of the Nordic Network of Textual Critics, Sandbjerg Gods (AarhusUniversity), September 30-October 2, 2011’, in: Editio 26 (2012) 1, 184-187, DOI:10.1515/editio-2012-0014.

26 M. Malm [et al.] (eds.), Bokens materialitet. Bokhistoria och bibliografi. Stockholm 2009.27 www.sks.dk.28 holbergsskrifter.dk.29 www.grundtvigsvaerker.dk. On national editions of Scandinavian authors, cf. the survey by

J. Kondrup, ‘Store tekstkritiske udgaver i Norden: Et overblik’, in: Fund og forskning 49(2010), 511-537.

30 In Kierkegaard's case: N.J. Cappelørn [et al.], Tekstspejle. Om Søren Kierkegaard sombogtilrettelaegger, boggiver og bogsamler. Esbjerg 2002. But also J. Kondrup, ‘Ekspressivtypografi hos Søren Kierkegaard?’, in: E. Damberg [et al.] (eds.), Litterat på eventyr. Festskrifttil Finn Hauberg Mortensen. Odense 2006, 39-57.

31 J. Kondrup, Editionsfilologi. København 2011, especially 273-328 on bibliographicaldescription, and 329-368, on manuscript description.

32 E.g. C. Benne, ‘Ossian: the book history of an anti-book?’, in: Variants 7 ‘Textual scholarshipand the canon’ (2008), 179-211; S. Frost, ‘Masterworks and merchandise. Showing off thegoods of Middlemarch’, in: Variants 6 ‘Textual scholarship and the material book’ (2010).Anne Mette Hansen edited Variants 4 (2005) dedicated to the theme ‘The book as artefact’.

33 J. Beyer, ‘Adressen von Druckern, Verlegern und Buchhändlern im 18. Jahrhundert. Zugleichein Beitrag zur Diskussion über ein VD18’, in:Wolfenbütteler Notizen zur Buchgeschichte31 (2006), 159-190.


Transnational print cultures in Scandinavia 1450-1525 at the Humboldt Universitätin


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Berlin.34Analysing Scandinavian book history between the catholic lateMiddle Agesand protestant modern times, Undorf discusses the concept of periphery and concludesthat ‘pre-Reformation book culture in Scandinavia didn't differ that much fromEuropean book culture at that time’.35 In his conclusion, Undorf seeks to refineDarnton's revised model by creating a model of transnational pre-Reformation printculture. Within the broader Scandinavian scope, the dissertation contains importantchapters on institutional and private provenances in Denmark and is a starting pointfor anyone interested in early modern provenances in Denmark.

Dissertations

The first Danish doctoral dissertation in the discipline of history of the book wassubmitted and passed in 1923 by librarian Lauritz Nielsen (1881-1947),36 who wrotehis dissertation in close connection to his seminal bibliography of fifteenth- andsixteenth-century Danish books.37 It was not until the new millennium that bookhistorical dissertations were again submitted.Ever since the PhD degree was introduced in Denmark in 1993, there have been

two different kinds of doctoral dissertations, i.e. the PhD dissertation and what issometimes called the higher doctoral dissertation. A higher doctoral degree can beobtained by mature researchers after the public defence of a dissertation based uponindividual and original research.The twomost important recent contributions to Danish book history are the doctoral

dissertationsMenigmands medie (1999) by Henrik Horstbøll and Laesning ogbog-marked i 1600-tallets Danmark (2001) by Charlotte Appel. They both combinean interest in social cultural history with book history, and they both at the outsetdeclare to have been inspired by Darnton and Chartier.38

Charlotte Appel investigates the history of the book in seventeenth-centuryDenmark (the Kingdom of Denmark, including the provinces that became Swedishin 1645/1648, but excluding Norway and the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein).39

Her main interest is in the relationship between the printed word and the ‘commonman’,

34 W.UndorfFromGutenberg to Luther. Transnational print cultures in Scandinavia 1450-1525.Berlin 2011; urn: nbn:de:kobv:11-100199197.

35 Ibidem, 510.36 L. Nielsen, Boghistoriske studier til dansk bibliografi 1550-1600. København 1923.37 L. Nielsen, Dansk bibliografi 1482-1550: med saerligt hensyn til dansk bogtrykkerkunsts

historie. København 1919; id., Dansk bibliografi 1551-1600. København 1929-1931; id.Registre til Dansk bibliografi 1482-1550 & 1551-1600. København 1935. A revised editionof Dansk bibliografi 1482-1600 was published with a supplementary volume by E. Dal in1996. Nielsen also published Dansk typografisk Atlas 1482-1600. København 1934.

38 When she started working on her project, Appel wrote an article on recent studies in bookhistory in English, French, German and Dutch, which is still an excellent Danish-languageintroduction: C. Appel, ‘Bogmarkedets og laesningens historie ca. 1500-1700 i nyereeuropaeisk forskning. En introduktion’, in: Fund og forskning 32 (1993), 185-234.

39 C. Appel: Laesning og bogmarked i 1600-tallets Danmark. København 2001. Review byJ.T. Lauridsen in Fund og forskning 41 (2002), 351-370.


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and she looks into both the history of reading and that of the book market. Appelanalyses the spread of literacy, the actual use of books and the books appearing ininventories made after death, socalled probate records.

Figure 2. Anon, ABC. København, Mads Vingaard, 1591. Popular books, such as this ABC, wereprinted in large numbers, but have hardly survived. Photo: The Photographic Studio, The RoyalLibrary

Thanks to Lauritz Nielsen the national bibliography of fifteenth- andsixteenth-century Danish books is well established; Appel has done a pioneeringwork on the seventeenth-century Danish book. She thoroughly investigates theauthorities' attempts to restrict the spread of ‘evil books’ through censorship andprohibition of import and to promote the spread of ‘good books’. She shows howthe number of printing presses quadrupled in the seventeenth century, and discussesto what extent we have access to ephemeral imprints. Dealing with ‘books survivingand books lost’, she argues that ‘even though many ephemeral imprints such asballads, newsletters and practical manuals have not survived to the present, theirexistence in seventeenth-century Denmark can be proven’ (948).40 Pointing to themany documented re-issues, Appel argues that even though the nineteenth-centuryDanish bibliography Bibliotheca Danica only cov-

40 For this aspect see also the exhibition catalogue: K. Skovgaard-Petersen (ed.), From dust togold. Handbooks and broadsheets from the Royal Library. København 2006.


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ers as little as 75% of the actual books printed, we probably know 90% of the booktitles that ever existed. (573-4).41 Finally, Appel addresses the question as to whetherthe books actually reached the common man. She concludes that poor people couldbuy popular books; analyses of ‘the intended reader’ of various publications revealthat a large number of publications were aimed at the ‘common man’, and her studyof inventories after death allows her to conclude that ‘a minimum of between thirtyand forty per cent of registered urban households were in possession of books in thelast decades of the seventeenth century’ (949). As John T. Lauridsen has pointedout, however, the greater part of the population was without any property.In his review in Fabula, Christoph Daxelmüller stated that if it were not for the

language, the book would have been of outstanding importance internationally: ‘Siewäre weit über die Grenzen des Landes hinaus von überragender Bedeutung, stündenicht - trotz einer englischen Zusammenfassung - die Sprache des Dänischen imWege (...)’.42 However, this barrier has since been overcome. Charlotte Appel was amember of the Steering Comittee of HIBOLIRE, The Nordic-Baltic-Russian Networkon the History of Books, Libraries and Reading, which existed from 2006 to 2010.43

Together with Karen Skovgaard-Petersen, Appel wrote the article ‘The history ofthe book in the Nordic countries’ and contributed many entries to the OxfordCompanion of the book.44 In 2011 Appel published, with her co-editor MortenFink-Jensen, the anthology Religious reading in the Lutheran north. Studies in earlymodern Scandinavian book culture.45 Appel and Fink-Jensen are currently finishinga collaborative research project on the history of education in Denmark.Henrik Horstbøll published his doctoral dissertation on the culture of popular print

in early modern Denmark in 1999.46 The book deals with popular print in a ratherlong period from the first book printed in Danish (Den danske Rimkrønike, 1495) tothe advent of industrialised printing around 1840. Popular print is defined as amediumthat addresses the commonman in the vernacular (29). The development of differentformats is discussed thoroughly, and the format of the book is added to Darnton'smodel of the communications circuit (316). Horstbøll finds convergences betweenprint format and the function of the medium on the one hand, and between printformat and language on the other, and concludes that ‘popular print in Denmark canbe recognised by the printed medium's use of the small formats’ (763). The analysisof for-

41 C.V. Bruun [et al.], Bibliotheca Danica Systematisk fortegnelse over den danske litteraturfra 1482-1830. København 1877-1902 (vol. 1-4) & 1914-31 (vol. 5). Revised edition 1961-63.H. Ehrencron-Müller, Supplement 1831-1840 til Bibliotheca Danica samt BibliothecaSlesvico-Holsatica til 1840. København 1948.

42 C. Daxelmüller, ‘Rezension zu Appel, Charlotte: Laesning og bogmarked i 1600-talletsDanmark, 2001’, in: Fabula. Zeitschrift für Erzählforschung 44 (2003), 317-320.

43 One of the outcomes was M. Dyrbye (ed.), Library spirit in the Nordic and Baltic countries.Historical perspectives. Tampere 2009.

44 M.F. Suarez, H.R. Woudhuysen (eds.), The Oxford companion to the book. Oxford 2010.45 C. Appel, M. Fink-Jensen (eds.), Religious reading in the Lutheran north. Studies in early

modern Scandinavian book culture. Newcastle upon Tyne 2011.46 H. Horstbøll,Menigmands medie, det folkelige bogtryk i Danmark 1500-1840. En

kulturhistorisk undersøgelse. København 1999. Review by Jürg Glauser in:Fabula, Zeitschriftfür Erzählforschung 45 (2004) 1/2, 140-143.


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mat poses the question whether prints in small formats have been less well preservedthan prints in larger formats. Horstbøll concludes that we know most of the titles butfar from all of the single editions, probably only 50-70%. In the third part of thedissertation he identifies the ‘effective history’ of the popular print, the conceptualcommunities created by print in general and popular print in particular, analysedthrough the three master concepts of Cosmos, Chronos, Topos and through the gridof a number of empirically derived genre-groups: ‘pamphlets, instructive anddevotional literature, chapbook stories, chronicles and history, and lastly almanacsand housekeeping literature’ (765).In a certain sense, Horstbøll combines the two domains that SvendDahl had singled

out between literary history and the history of books: ‘the spiritual content of booksand their authors' contribution to history of thought’ with ‘the historical developmentof the book as a material object’.47 The book has inspired similar research inScandinavia. Since 2009, Henrik Horstbøll has held the only Scandinavian chair inbook history, at Lund University. He is a prolific writer and has published individualchapters of the book in revised versions in English and German.48

Several PhD students in departments of Scandinavian studies have worked onbook historical dissertations. At the University of Aarhus, Christina Holst Faerchwrote her PhD dissertation on literary works that circulated in manuscript in the firsthalf of the eighteenth century because they could not be printed within the legalframework of the absolutist state.49 She deals in particular with the satiric and eroticwritings of pastor Hans Hansen Nordrup (1681-1750), whose works exist inmanuscripts in Aarhus and Copenhagen. His pasquils had their own manuscriptdistribution, but could not be printed because of censorship.50

At the University of Copenhagen, Anne Mette Hansen wrote her PhD dissertationon medieval prayer books and material philology.51 Also, a number of PhD students

47 In her book on Danish medieval literature, Sanselig senmiddelalder, litteraere perspektiverpå danske tekster 1482-1523. Århus 2010, Pil Dahlerup moves in the opposite direction,from literary history to history of the book.

48 H. Horstbøl, ‘In Octavo. Die Formveränderung der Kleinen Historien auf dem dänischemBuchmarkt vom 16. bis zum 19. Jahrhundert’, in: J. Glauser, A.K. Richter (eds.), Text, Reihe,Transmission. Unfestigkeit als Phänomen skandinavischer Erzählprosa 1500-1800.Tübingen/Basle 2012; id., ‘The unstable almanac. Transformations of the almanac in Denmarkin the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries’, in: R. Siegert [et al.] (eds.) Volksbildung durchLesestoffe im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert Voraussetzungen - Medien - Topographie /Educatingthe people through reading material in the 18. and 19. centuries: principles - media -topography, Bremen 2012; id., ‘The politics of publishing. Freedom of the press in Denmark1770-1773’, in: P. Ihalainen [et al.] (eds.), Scandinavia in the age of revolution. Nordicpolitical cultures, 1740-1820. Farnham 2011, 145-156.

49 C. Holst Faerch,Utrykkelighed og enevaelde. Politisk satire og erotisk digtning i 1700-talletmed saerligt henblik på Hans Nordrups forfatterskab. Aarhus 2012.

50 See also: C. Holst Faerch, ‘Bisp Deichman og den sorte pest. Om paskviller oghåndskriftdigtning i første halvdel af 1700-tallet’, in: Lychnos 2010, 137-146; id., ‘En saerdelesparfumeret retorik. Danske smaedevers i 1600- og 1700-tallet’, in: Rhetorica Scandinavica57 (2010), 60-78.

51 A.M. Hansen, Den danske bønnebogstradition i materialfilologisk belysning. København2005. Cf. id., ‘Die Transmission spätmittelalterlicher Gebetbücher als Primärquelle zurtextkritischen Ausgabe. Zwei dänische Gebetbücher aus der Zeit der Einführung desBuchdrucks in Dänemark in materialphilologischer und transmissionstheoretischerBeleuchtung’, in: Glauser, Richter, Text, Reihe, Transmission.


have worked at the intersection of philology, textual scholarship, sociology ofliterature


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and book history. Jens Bjerring-Hansen wrote his dissertation on Ludvig Holbergand the book, and currently works on a post-doctoral project with regard to theseventeenth-century learned antiquarians at the Danish Society for language andLiterature (DLS).52 Torben Jelsbak wrote his dissertation on the challenges posed tomodern philology by the literary material of the historical avant-gardes (such asmontage, typographic poems and artists' books).53

By analysing the popular workGitte's monologer by the poet Per Højholt (publishedas books, radio readings, audio and video releases and performed live by Højholt),Klaus Nielsen has tried to devise a method for using material aspects in the study ofliterature. He also tried to develop a uniform concept of the literary work, commonto literary history and book history.54 The title of the dissertation provocatively invitesthe reader to always judge the book by the cover. Nielsen does not stand alone withthis provocation. Tore Rye Andersen recently published an article on the functionof dust jackets and paratexts in novels by David Foster Wallace and ThomasPynchon.55

Using Bourdieu's theory of the literary field and Genette's notion of paratextuality,Anders Juhl Rasmussen wrote his PhD dissertation on a special variant oftwentieth-century Danish prose-modernism, tied to the publishing house Arena.56

Together with Thomas Hvid Kromann, Juhl Rasmussen has published an edition ofthe small leaflets published by Arena, Arena-information.57 Hvid Kromann haspublished articles on Danish artists' books.58

Book history and literary studies

In 2010 an anthology on book history edited by Jens Bjerring-Hansen and TorbenJelsbak was published in the series Modern Literary Theory, published by AarhusUniversity Press.59 The publication of the anthology within this series is an eloquentwitness of the rise of book history as an academic discipline within literary studies.

52 J. Bjerring-Hansen, Holberg og bogen. Om Peder Paars, socialt forfatterskab oglitteraturhistoriens empiriske grundlag. København 2010.

53 T. Jelsbak, Avantgardefilologi og teksttransmission. Den historiske avantgardelitteratur somudfordring til moderne filologi og litteraturforskning. København 2008. Cf. his article inLychnos 2010.

54 K. Nielsen, Døm altid bogen på omslaget. Om boghistorie og litteraturanalyse - og Gittesmonologer. København 2012.

55 T. Rye Andersen, ‘Judging by the cover’, in: Critique. Studies in contemporary fiction 53(2012) 3, 251-278. The article is a revised translation of T. Rye Andersen, ‘Omslag’ in:Passage. Tidsskrift for litteratur og kritik 57 (2007), 66-104;ojs.statsbiblioteket.dk/index.php/passage/article/view/1393/1281.

56 A. Juhl Rasmussen, Arenamodernisme. Rekonstruktion af en position i nyere dansk litteratur.København 2011.

57 A. Juhl Rasmussen, T.H. Kromann (eds.), Arena-information. Et kapitel i dansk forlags- oglitteraturhistorie. København 2011.

58 T.H. Kromann, ‘Skrifflader i svenske, danske og engelske kunstnerbøger’, in: C. Handberg,J. Løgstrup (eds.), Blandt ord & billede. En antologi om forholdet mellem billedkunst oglitteratur. København 2011, 49-65.

59 J. Bjerring-Hansen, T. Jelsbak (eds.), Boghistorie. Aarhus 2010.


The editors introduce book history as a tool in literary studies, well aware that it isby no means evident that an introduction to book history should be part of a serieson modern literary theory. On the other hand they argue that book history should beconsid-


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ered a part of the ‘return to history’ of the last 25 years in comparative literature.The editors place the field of book history within an interdisciplinary trianglecomposed by history, bibliography and literary studies (13-14), but their selectionof texts reflects - for good reasons - the part of the immense field of book historywhich is of particular interest to literary studies and especially literary theory. Allseven essays take as their point of departure the books of belles lettres printed inEurope from the eighteenth to the twentieth century.60

A proof of what literary history and book history can do together - and yet anotherevidence of the new importance assigned to book history in literary studies - is givenby the new history of Danish literature published by Gyldendal. The very first chapter,significantly entitled ‘In the beginning was the book’,61 departs from the tradition ofstarting with runes and pagan oral traditions and begins instead with late medievalbook culture in Denmark.62

Bookbindings, provenance, and the history of collections

Although they have not been the subject of doctoral dissertations, bookbindings havealso caught the attention of researchers. The history of Danish bookbinding from1650 to c.1800 was explored in the 1990s in a series of articles by Ingrid Ilsøe.63

Research has been published on medieval bookbindings, as has an interestingcontribution on so-called ‘multiple-strand bookmarkers’ from the field of textileresearch.64Karsten Christensen, who has done extensive research on sixteenth-centurybookbindings, has studied bookbindings in a specific diocese library, and MikaelKristensen has published a Who's who of Danish bookbinders in the period from1880 to 2000, taking up a title used by Emil Hannover in the beginning of thetwentieth century, ‘kunstfaerdige danske bogbind’.65

As more and more rare books become available online, their role as museumobjects in the library is highlighted. This entails an interest in copy-specificinformation. In recent years provenance research has becomemore andmore importantin the research of The Royal Library and other libraries in Denmark. The origin,history and fate of a

60 K. Skovgaard-Petersen, review, in: Danske Studier 106 (2011), 226-229.61 L.B. Mortensen, ‘I begyndelsen var bogen’ in: K.P. Mortensen, M. Schack (eds.) Dansk

litteraturs historie, vol. 1: 1100-1800. København 2007.62 I am obliged to Bjerring-Hansen, Holberg og bogen, which made this break very clear to

me.63 Cf. Horstbøll, ‘Survey’, 174.64 A.M. LindskogMidtgaard, ‘Medeltida danska bokband i Det Kongelige Biblioteks samling:

en preliminär undersöknin’, in: Fund og forskning 44 (2005), 43-61; K. Christensen, ‘Etgenfundet middelalderligt laedersnitbogbbind’, in:Magasin fra Det Kongelige Bibliotek 16/4(2003), 33-38; J. Boutrup, ‘Multiple-strand bookmarkers and other book-connected textiles’,in: Care and conservation of manuscripts 13 (2012), 327-340; J. Vnouček, M. Suchý, ‘ThePrague Sacramentary. Frommanuscript folia back to animal skin’, in:Care and conservationof manuscripts 13 (2012), 235-266.

65 K. Christensen, ‘Bogbind i Sjaellands Stiftsbibliotek: nogle eksempler fra de aeldre samlinger’,in: Årbog for Historisk Samfund for Roskilde Amt (2012), 113-122; M. Kristensen,Bogbindernes blå bog: kunstfaerdige danske bogbind ca. 1880-2000. Hellerup 2010.


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Figure 3. The Italian expatriate scholar Giacomo Castelvetro (1546-1616) lived in Denmark fromAugust 1594 to October 1595. A number of his manuscripts and books are now kept in The RoyalLibrary. Some of the books are heavily annotated, like this copy of a book published in 1568 inFerrara. Photo: The Photographic Studio, The Royal Library


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number of private and public collections have been described in journal articles andanthologies.66

Every Danish work on provenance necessarily draws upon the work of HaraldIlsøe, the official chronicler of The Royal Library, where he has worked as a researchlibrarian and senior researcher.67 Ilsøe has published on most aspects of book history,including printers,68 binders, authors, collectors and auctions. For the celebration ofthe 200th anniversary of public access to The Royal Library in 1993, he wrote avoluminous book on the treasures of the library.69 In 1999, Ilsøe published atwo-volume study of the early foundations of The Royal Library, which serves as abible for anyone working on its history.70 He later published a select bibliography ofDanish book auctions in the period 1661-1811.71 Most recently he has published alavishly illustrated work on illustrated cloth bindings and book covers in Denmark.72

On the occasion of his eightieth birthday in January 2013, a volume of the journalFund og forskning i Det Kongelige Biblioteks samlingerwas published as aFestschriftto his honour.At The Royal Library the interest in publishing knowledge about royal ownership

marks was originally spurred by the numerous book thefts from the library in the1970s, whichwere finally solved in 2003 uponwhich several persons were convicted.73

Aweb exhibition on royal identificationmarks was created as a tool to identify books

66 O.A. Hedegaard, ‘Haerens boghistoriske samling. En militaerkulturel skat’, in:Militaerttidsskrift 126 (1997) 1, 94-106; R. Bentzen, ‘Lord Harley og grev Thott. En studie i nogleaf Det Kongelige Biblioteks bind og bøger fra Harleys og Thotts bogsamlinger’, in: Fundog forskning 44 (2005), 277-369; T. Schlichtkrull, ‘Det Classenske bibliotek. Samlingensudvikling og videre skaebne’, in: Bibliotekshistorie 8 (2007), 5-37; P. Kragelund, ‘Ejermaerkeri Danmarks Kunstbiblioteks aeldre samling 1754 til 1810’, in: Fund og forskning 50 (2011),287-314; H. Horstbøll, M. Bregnsboe, ‘Dronning Caroline Mathildes bøger. Et inventariumfra juli-august 1775 over dronning Caroline Mathildes efterladte bogsamling’, in: Danskemagazin indeholdende bidrag til den danske histories oplysning 51 (2012) 2, 555-581; H.-Chr.Eisen, Sjaellands Stiftsbibliotek 1812 til 2012. En historie omDanmarks første stiftsbibliotek.Roskilde 2012.

67 Ilsøe of course also builds upon a tradition, and concerning provenance one should at leastmention the pioneering work done by OttoWalde (1879-1963), such as ‘Studier i äldre danskbibliotekshistoria’, in: Nordisk tidskrift för bok- och biblioteksväsen 19 (1932), 1-66.

68 H. Ilsøe, Bogtrykkerne i København og deres virksomhed, ca. 1600-1810. En biobibliografiskhåndbog med bidrag til bogproduktionens historie. København 1992.

69 H. Ilsøe, On parchment, paper and palm leaves. Treasures of the Royal Library, Denmark.København 1993.

70 H. Ilsøe, Det kongelige Bibliotek i støbeskeen. Studier og samlinger til bestandens historieindtil ca. 1780. København 1999.

71 H. Ilsøe, Biblioteker til salg, om danske bogauktioner og kataloger 1661-1811. København2007.

72 H. Ilsøe,De gamle bogomslag. 610 dekorerede danske bogomslag fra ca. 1820-1920 afbildetog praesenteret af Harald Ilsøe. København 2013. Ilsøe has already published several articleson illustrated cloth binding in Fund og forskning: H. Ilsøe, ‘Danske komponerede bind ca.1860-1877. Bidrag til en praesentation’, in: Fund og forskning 41 (2002), 171-212; ‘Danskekomponerede bind ca. 1877-1888. Bidrag til en praesentation’, in: Fund og forskning 42(2003); 177-275; ‘Danske komponerede bind ca. 1888-1900. Bidrag til en praesentation’,in: Fund og forskning 43 (2004); 177-265; ‘De billige bøgers indtog i dansk boghandel1908-1918’, in: Fund og forskning 45 (2006), 107-172.

73 On the thefts, see www.kb.dk/en/kb/manglende-boger/index.html and L. Korsgaard, S.Surrugue, Det store bogtyveri. København 2005.


belonging to The Royal Library, but it is also used as a working resource and hasrecently been expanded by many private ownership marks.74 In order to determinethe extent of the

74 www.kb.dk/en/nb/tema/webudstillinger/Royal_Identification_Marks/index.html. Cf. K.Skovgaard-Petersen, ‘Royal identificationmarks - a digital exhibition of characteristic featureson the books of the Royal Library, Copenhagen’, in: Care and conservation of manuscripts10 (2008), 224-34; S. Strecker, ‘Kongelige kendetegn: ejermaerker på KBs bøger’, in:Magasin fra Det Kongelige Bibliotek 25 (2012) 3, 12-27.


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thefts between 1979 and 1999 the library conducted a total survey of its oldcollections. Provenances were noted, and these notes are currently being entered bylibrarians as metadata in the online catalogue.75 Queries are posted on the ‘Can YouHelp?’-page on CERL'S Provenance Information website.76

Figure 4. Book cover of H. Iversen, Amerikanske Tilstande. En Rapport til unge Nordboer. København1920, as reproduced in H. Ilsøe, De gamle bogomslag. Photo: The Photographic Studio, The RoyalLibrary

A keen interest has been taken in recent years in virtual reconstructions of thelibrary of Gottorp Castle, which in its time was a rich, princely library.77 It wasfounded as an institution in 1606 by Duke Johann Adolf (1575-1616) ofSchleswig-Holstein-Gottorp and continued by his successors. In 1713, following theSeven Years' War, the library was captured by the Danish king and then, between1735 and 1749, transferred to The Royal Library. Many of the great treasures of TheRoyal Library - among them a copy of the second part of the Gutenberg Bible - stemfrom this library.

75 J. Rui Aadna, ‘Synliggørelse af proveniens i KBs bøger’, in:Magasin fra Det KongeligeBibliotek 25 (2012) 3, 28-33.

76 See: www.cerl.org/resources/provenance/main.77 E. Petersen, ‘Bibliotheca Gottorpiensis Manuscripta. The inventories of the manuscripts of

Gottorp’, in: U. Kuder [et al.], Die Bibliothek der Gottorfer Herzöge. Symposium, StiftungSchleswig-Holsteinische Landesmuseen Schloss Gottorf. Nordhausen 2008, 117-128; K.Skovgaard-Petersen, ‘Gottorp books in The Royal Library of Copenhagen. Methodologicalconsiderations on the possibilities of identification’, and I. Boserup: ‘Some new ways toidentify prints with a Gottorp provenance in The Royal Library, Copenhagen’, in: I. Boserup,D.J. Shaw (eds.), Virtual visits to lost libraries. Reconstruction of and access to dispersedcollections. London 2011, 131-148 and 148-168. Cf. D. Lohmeier, ‘Die Gottorfer Bibliothek’,in: Heinz Spielmann [et al.] (eds.): Gottorf im Glanz des Barock. Kunst und Kultur amSchleswiger Hof 1544-1713. Vol. 1. Schleswig 1997, 324-347.


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Figure 5. Super ex libris of Christian Albrecht (1641-1694), duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp,bishop of Lübeck, on the binding of The Royal Library's copy of the Gutenberg-bible. Photo: ThePhotographic Studio, The Royal Library

In his doctoral dissertation Intellectum liberare. Johann Albert Fabricius - enhumanist i Europa, Erik Petersen studies the role of the philologist and theologianJohann Albert Fabricius (1668-1736) in the book trade and gives an overview of themanuscripts and annotated books in the Fabricius collection that once belonged toMarquard Gude (1635-1689), who worked as a librarian in the Gottorp library.78

Fabricius' manuscript collection is now in The Royal Library.The Royal Library also has a collection of ex-libris, parts of which have been cut

out of books in the old collections. It is embarrassing to admit that the ex-librisdesigned by Albrecht Dürer for Willibald Pirckheimer was cut out of one of theincunabula. Previously, the incunabula were believed to contain illustrations by Düreras well, but this misunderstanding has recently been corrected.79 The collection ofex-libris deserves to be studied.Frederikshavn Kunstmuseum & Exlibrissamling in Northern Jutland holds an

important ex-libris collectionwhich is currently being digitised.80Cooperation betweenthe two institutions might be fruitful.

78 E. Petersen, Intellectum liberare. Johann Albert Fabricius - en humanist i Europa. København1998.

79 I. Magnussen, V. Thorlacius-Ussing, ‘Willibald Pirckheimer og Albrecht Dürer. Et nyt Fund,I& II’, in: Fund og forskning 5-6 (1958-1959), 110-128; cf. Germanisches Nationalmuseum,Heilige und Hasen. Bücherschätze der Dürerzeit. Nürnberg 2008, 80.

80 See: www.art-exlibris.net.


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Other trends in book historical research

Children's literature is an important aspect of the literary market and of the publiclibraries in Denmark, and research in children's literature takes place at The Centrefor Children's Literature, Aarhus University, headed by Nina Christensen.81 Recentyears have witnessed both a new history of children's literature in Denmark and adiscussion of the difference between a literary and a book historical approach tochildren's literature.82

Recently, much attention has been given to typography as a part of bookcraftsmanship, in particular to the creation of new types for, among others, thepublishing house Vandkunsten (Niebuhr Antikva by Allan Daastrup) and theephemeral newspaper Dagen (designed by e-types) which existed for 40 days in2002. The same year saw the more successful publication of the new Danish hymnbook designed by Carl-H.K. Zakrisson, who chose the Arnhem typeface developedby the Dutch typographer Fred Smeijers. The interest in typography has also givenrise to research and exhibitions. Sofie Beier has tried to combine insights from thehistory of typography and reading research in her study of high-legibility typefaces.83

The typeface Abrams Venetian, which was given to the printer and publisher PoulKristensen for his exclusive use in 1989, was exhibited at the Media museum in2012. In the same month a festschrift was published in honor of Poul Kristensen atthe occasion of his ninetieth birthday.84 In a facsimile edition of a manuscript of Lexregia, Jesper Düring Jørgensen studied the textual history of the Lex regia, andidentified Frederik Rostgaard's typographical inspiration from the French typefaceRomain du Roi.85Caroline Nyvang, who is finishing her PhD dissertation, has recently published

on the history of Danish cookery books.86Research has also been done on censorship.Jesper Jakobsen has written about censorship in eighteenth-century Denmark -

81 See: N. Christensen, ‘How to make sense. Reflections on the influence of eighteenth centurypicturebooks on picture-books of today’, in: New directions in picturebook research. NewYork/London 2010, 55-67; id., ‘Les tout-petits et leurs albums. Une perspective scandinave’,in: Revue des livres pour enfants 257 (2011), 105-111.

82 A. Øster, ‘Litteraturhistorie eller boghistorie? Børnelitteraturhistorieskrivningensudfordringer’, in: K. Esmann Knudsen (ed.), Historiske fortaellinger. Historieformidling oglitteratur. København/Odense 2008.

83 S. Beier, Reading letters. Designing for legibility. Amsterdam 2012.84 Bogtrykkeren, festskrift til Poul Kristensen, 12. januar 2012. Herning 2012. Cf. M. Lowry,

Venetian printing. Nicolas Jenson and the rise of the Roman letterform. Herning 1989, whichused Abrams Venetian for the first time.

85 J. Düring Jørgensen, D. Tamm (eds.),Kongeloven. Thomaesons håndskrift. København 2012.86 C. Nyvang, ‘Originaler og kopister. Danske trykte kogebøger 1616-1900’, in:Magasin fra

Det Kongelige Bibliotek 20:4 (2007), 15-21; id., ‘Mutter som kogebogsforfatter. Dansketrykte kogebøger i 1800-tallet’, in: Personalhistorisk tidsskrift 128 (2008) 1, 101-13; id.,‘Medie og måltid - danske trykte kogebøger i 1800-tallet’, in: O. Hyldtoft (ed.), Syn på madog drikke i 1800-tallet. København 2010, 145-231.


providing a useful survey of previous research87 - and Henrik Horstbøll has writtenabout the period of press freedom in Denmark 1770-1773.88

87 J. Jakobsen, ‘Omorganiseringen af den teologiske censur. Generalkirkeinspektionskollegietscensurvirksomhed 1737-1747’, in: Historisk tidsskrift 111 (2011) 1, 1-36; id., ‘ChristianGottlob Proft og de utilladelige skrifter. Bogforbud i årene efter trykkefrihedsperioden’, in:Fund og forskning 51 (2012), 289-309, in which Jakobsen draws upon C. Meyer, ‘Farligeog forbudte skrifter i Helsingør: En episode’, in: Fra Frederiksborg Amt: årbog, 2000, 49-63.See also H. Ilsøe, ‘Censur og approbation. Lidt om bogcensurens administration i16-1700tallet’, in: J.T. Lauridsen, O. Olsen (eds.), Umisteligt. København 2007, 119-135.

88 H. Horstbøll, ‘Bolle Willum Luxdorphs samling af trykkefrihedens skrifter 1770-1773’, in:Fund og forskning 44 (2005), 371-414.


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Early European Books and national bibliography

What is really new in book history is the research infra-structure resulting fromdigitisation. The Royal Library was the first library to enter into a partnership withProQuest for the mass digitisation of early printed books in the Early European Books(EEB) database; ‘Collection 1’ in EEB consisted of pre-1601 Danish books from itscollections. EEB issues annual collections of around 4000 books and will be publishingcollections for many years to come. The Royal Library is currently contributing withDanica from the seventeenth century and in the coming years the entire collectionof incunabula will be digitised. Recently, the books fromKaren Brahe's Library werealso made available in the database. One of the many advantages of EEB is that allthe copies of an edition in the national library are scanned, which means that all eightcopies of the 1514 Parisian edition of Saxo'sGesta Danorum have now been digitised.The business model implies that the books from The Royal Library are accessible

for free in Denmark and at a cost everywhere else in the world. ProQuest holdsexclusive rights for ten years to Collection 1, which, in 2010 was criticised by theFrench national librarian, Bruno Racine, for being a ‘clause d'exclusivité drastique’.89

Of course, those books that are not in The Royal Library are not available in EEB.90

Another bibliographical disadvantage is that - in contrast to Lauritz Nielsen'sbibliography - EEB does not give any bibliographical information on books that weknow once existed but which are no longer extant.91 Some of these books exist inmanuscript copies. It is, therefore, still necessary to use Nielsen's printed bibliography.Cooperation with ProQuest showed that mass-digitisation is also a question of

providing and producing metadata. It has been a welcome occasion for The RoyalLibrary to improve all catalogue records of Danish books from the seventeenth-centurywhile preparing the books for scanning, and it will hopefully eventually lead to thecreation of a modern replacement of Bibliotheca Danica.A recently published catalogue of Scandinavian books in the British Library has

shown the weaknesses of Bibliotheca Danica.92 The catalogue only contains a minorpart of the total number of records in the catalogues of the corresponding nationalbibliographies, but they are described in very great detail. The review of the catalogueby Karen Skovgaard-Petersen makes it clear that there are huge differences in thelevel of bibliographical description in the various national bibliographies.93 Danishsixteenth-century books are well described, but for the later centuries, until 1830,the Bibliotheca Danica remains the fundamental work. Because of the detaileddecriptions and the many indices and cross-references, Skovgaard-Petersen finds thecatalogue a good starting point for any kind of research on Scandinavian literature,especially for the Danish material.

89 B. Racine, Google et le nouveau monde. Paris 2010, 113.90 Out of the 1672 numbers in Nielsen's bibliography, 181 are not in the holdings of The Royal

Library. Copies of 53 of these editions are in Karen Brahe's library, and have consequentlybeen added to EEB.

91 27 of the first 298 numbers in Nielsen's bibliography refer to no longer extant editions.92 British Library,Catalogue of Scandinavian books in the British Library printed before 1801.

London 2007.93 K. Skovgaard-Petersen, review of Catalogue of Scandinavian books in the British Library

printed before 1801, in: Fund og forskning 49 (2010), 543-552.


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Figure 6. ‘Frederik II's War Book’. København, Lorentz Benedicht, 1578. The book, printed in onlyone copy, contains seven sections on various aspect of the science of warfare. It is now availablethrough Early European Books. Photo: The Photographic Studio, The Royal Library


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The Universal Short Title Catalogue, based in St. Andrews, has created newbibliographies of Latin and vernacular books published in France, of books publishedin the Low Countries and of books published in the Iberian peninsula and is planningto collect and analyse information on books published in Eastern Europe andScandinavia. This might be a way to proceed in order to create a Scandinavianbibliography.Books that used to be extremely difficult to access are now available for free from

any Danish IP-address. This means that many more people have access to Danishrare books and that the individual researcher has rapid access to (reproductions of)a great number of books. Whereas a researcher interested in the bindings of theDanish sixteenth-century books could until recently order only a limited amount ofbooks per day, he or she is now able to browse through 2600 copies and make a rapidselection of the interesting ones.

EEB has revolutionised research for the relatively few scholars already workingon sixteenth-century Danish books, and hopefully it will make many more scholarswork on those books - and inspire teaching.

Further perspectives

In Danish - where understatement is generally preferred to hyperbole - it is commonto use an idiom which literally translated says ‘none mentioned, none forgotten’. Ihave mentionedmany names and consequently run the risk of forgetting other namesfor which I apologise. I am also aware that my perspective from The Royal Libraryin Copenhagen may imply a certain bias.Much work still remains to be done on provenance in Danish libraries. Walde's

article (together with his personal archive in Uppsala) and Ilsøe's work remainimportant studies on which to build. Recent years have shown, what exciting storiescan be told by tracing the history of a manuscript or of a specific copy of a printedbook.94 If one considers the size of the collections of manuscripts and rare books,this approach opens up a myriad of possibilities.One of the desiderata mentioned by Undorf in his doctoral dissertation is a

bibliography of books printed before 1525 in Scandinavian collections. Hisobservation that there was a massive import of Dutch books to Scandinavia around1480 leads to another desideratum: ‘It might be interesting to see whether Dutcharchival sources provide any information on what appears to be an expansive era ofDutch printing and its impact on Scandinavia and Northern Europe in general’.95

In 2011, Sune De Souza Schmidt-Madsen's history of the Bonnier publishinghouses in Denmark was published, covering the period from 1804, when GutkindHirschel cre-

94 I. Boserup, ‘Videnskabelig (kilde)udgivelse og den digitale revolution’, in: E. Kolding Nielsen[et al.] (eds.), Kommunikation erstatter transport. Den digitale revolution i danskeforskningsbiblioteker 1980-2005. København 2005 (on Guaman Poma's Nueva Corónica,Peru 1615); T. Schlichtkrull, ‘Audubon: Birds of America’, in: Fund og forskning 49 (2010),237-282; E. Petersen: ‘Propriamanu. OmErasmus af Rotterdams testamente og hans efterladtepapirer’, ibidem, 7-56.

95 Undorf From Gutenberg to Luther, 510.


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ated a lending library, a book store and a publishing house - and changed his nameto Bonnier.96 This kind of publishing history should be continued.Lauritz Nielsen started working on a history of Danish private libraries, but he

only finished the first volume dealing with the seventeenth century. Since some ofthe great libraries are still virtually untouched, a continuation of this work would bevery welcome. Indeed, one of the main sources for the treasures of The Royal Libraryis the incredibly rich library of Otto Thott (1703-1785). He left virtually no personaldocuments concerning his library, and other sources for its history are few inDenmark, but it might be worthwhile to look for them abroad; annotated auctioncatalogues would help as well.97 I hope to be able to proceed in this direction. TheUniversity Library's copy of the 12 volume auction catalogue of Thott's library, inwhich the names of the persons and institutions that bought books at the auction areinscribed, is a tremendous and underexploited resource.98

A proper description of the chapter library of Lund Cathedral is a desideratum inthe field of book history in Denmark. Fortunately, Thomas Rydén at the Universityof Lund is currently working on a project to catalogue its collection of manuscripts.Likewise, Torsten Schlichtkrull has just started working on a history of theCopenhagen University Library after the fire in 1728.A certain number of major existing manor house libraries are currently being

catalogued, and a proper use of these inventories could contribute to our understandingof the learned culture in Denmark through the centuries.One might also concentrate on one person's impact in the literary field. Peter

Zeeberg has shown the way for this kind of studies in his bio-bibliography of theDanish viceroy in the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, Heinrich Rantzau(1526-1598), who was a prolific publisher-writer, the owner of a rich library andacted as a patron for scholars.99

Concerning book collections and the book trade, it would be interesting to shedlight on the European connections in the book trade before 1800.100How did collectorsin Denmark acquire foreign books?101 By which agents in Europe?What letters fromDanish collectors are preserved in foreign libraries?Henrik Waldkirch (active 1598-1629) was the most important Danish printer of

his time. Harald Ilsøe's portrait in his book on Danish printers might be used as astarting

96 S.D.S. Schmidt-Madsen, Bonnier Forlagene i Danmark: en forlagskrønike. København2007. Schmidt-Madsen also wrote a book at the 40th anniversary of Lindhardt og Ringhofpublishers: S.D.S. Schmidt-Madsen, Lindhardt og Ringhof. Et forlagseventyr. København2011.

97 Cf. on the annotated auction catalogue of Gram's library, K. Christensen,‘Universitetsbibliotekets inkunabler. Til en opløst samlings historie’, in: Bøger. biblioteker,mennesker. Et nordisk Festskrift tilegnet Torben Nielsen. København 1988, 65.

98 Catalogi bibliothecae Thottianae tomus I [-VII]. Havniae: Nic. Møller (...), 1789-1795.(Copenhagen, KB, I 6295 8o).

99 P. Zeeberg, Heinrich Rantzau. A bibliography. København 2004.100 K. Jensen, Revolution and the antiquarian book. Reshaping the past, 1780-1815. Cambridge

2011, could be used for inspiration.101 Henrik Horstbøll recently published a study, inspired by Robert Darnton's study of STN, of

the correspondence between STN and the publisher C. Philibert in Copenhagen: H. Horstbøll,‘En bogtrykker og boghandler i København. Claude Philiberts forbindelse med Sociététypographique de Neuchâtel 1771-1783’, in: Fund og forskning 51 (2012), 311-335.


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point for an inquiry into his connections at the Frankfurt fair and in Basle. Waldkirchis known to have been a mail carrier for Danish scholars,102 and Dennis E. Rhodeshas described how, on 14March 1592, the Danish physician Gellius Sascerides wroteto the Italian mathematician and astronomer Giovanni Antonio Magini, that ‘if youwant to send anything to Tycho Brahe, I think the best idea would be for you to giveit to J.B. Ciotti the Venetian printer to take to Conrad Waldkirchius at Frankfurt.’103

The printer ConradWaldkirch in Basle was HenrikWaldkirch's uncle and there wereclose ties between the two houses.Much research has been done into the history of reading in Denmark, but instead

of looking for evidence of literacy one might take the books (printed and handwritten)and their readers as a point of departure, in search of marginalia.104 Louis Hjelmslev'scopy of fellow linguist Viggo Brøndal's book Ordklasserne (1928) is an interestingobject for inquiry into twentieth-century linguistics,105 and Jakob Ulfeldt's marginalnotes to his manuscripts on contemporary sixteenth-century Europe might give usan idea about what a Danish nobleman learned about the world during his studyabroad.106

Turning to the borrowing records of The Royal Library would be anotherpossibility. The library has 133 volumes of borrowing records covering the period1778-1935, that have been used by scholars working on, for instance, Kierkegaardand Grundtvig. The borrowing records have been portrayed by Christian Kaatmannas a buried treasure.107

Another possibility would be to analyse reading as it is taking place. Reading roomreaders often describe the encounter with a long searched for book in the readingroom as an emotional event: accelerated heart beats, time standing still, awe orecstasy. It would be interesting to see a cognitive research project carried out at TheRoyal Library on the two different reading situations, reading the same rare book inthe reading room after having overcome various barriers and at home in front of thescreen using the Early European Books website.The two doctoral dissertations mentioned in this article were written by historians

with an interest in cultural history. A significant new trend in book historical researchin Denmark, since Horstbøll published his survey in 2005, is the way book historyhas entered literary studies, and especially Scandinavian studies. With the recentlypublished handbook and the active Nordic network, the ground has been preparedfor coming research projects. Apart from the perspectives that I have hinted at here,judging the book by its cover, or rather including the function of dust jackets, book

102 A. Frøland, Dansk boghandels historie 1482 til 1945. København 1974, 69.103 D.E. Rhodes, ‘Some neglected aspects of the career of Giovanni Battista Ciotti’, in: The

library, 6th series 9 (1987) 3, 230-231.104 H.J. Jackson,Marginalia. Readers writing in books. New Haven 2001. Cf. E. Jørgensen's

review of O. Walde, Storhetstidens litterara krigsbyten, in: Historisk tidsskrift, 9th series 2(1921-1923), 384-386.

105 The Royal Library, ms. Acc. 1965/95.106 F. Zuliani, ‘En samling politiske håndskrifter fra slutningen af det 16. århundrede. Giacomo

Castelvetro og Christian Barnekows bibliotek’, in: Fund og forskning 50 (2011), 240; cf. D.Tamm, Christian den fjerdes kanslere. København 1987, 44.

107 C. Kaatmann, ‘En nedgraven skat. Det Kgl. Biblioteks udlån 1778-1820’, in: Fund ogforskning 33 (1994), 119-149.


covers and para-texts in literary history, seems a promising endeavour for literarystudies.


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In 2013 an exhibition on the Art of the Book in Denmark showcasing 50 Danishprinted books from 1482 to the present will open at The Royal Library. The centuriesold and recently revitalised discipline book history seems to be thriving in Denmarkin the field of tension between history, bibliography and literary studies, wheretraditional bibliography all of a sudden finds itself being the weaker part.


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César Manrique FigueroaStudying the book in Hispanic AmericaThe process of consolidation of national identities

Book history in Latin America, at least from a Western point of view (since thepre-Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica boasted their own codices, with their ownwriting systems), started strictly under the Spanish colonial regime that triggered theEuropeanisation of Spanish America, or rather its Hispanicisation. This relativelyperipheral position with respect to Europe during the ancien régime, together withthe independence processes during the nineteenth century and the modernisation ofmost Latin American nations in the last hundred years, directly determined the linesof study regarding book historical activities.Hence, the present text provides an overview of book history in Latin America

from the colonial period to present day, with special attention to those authors thathave produced themost important contributions in the field fromMexico to Argentina.Moreover, this review presents and discusses the most relevant topics and trendsgenerated in this vast cultural and geographical region, as well as theprofessionalisation and modernisation of the current lines of research, to finallyprovide a general idea of the challenges expected for the future.

General historical frame

The Spanish occupation, conquest and colonisation of an enormous range ofgeographical areas all over the New World from the late fifteenth century, butespecially after the conquest of the Aztec and Inca Empires during the sixteenthcentury, launched one of the most fascinating and complex developing processes ofa new reality and society in human experience: the colonial or viceroyal SpanishAmerica.1 This period became a real

1 Both terms, ‘colonial’ and ‘viceroyal’, have been extensively used in historiography; it ismore accurate to speak about viceroyalties when referring to Mexico (New Spain) and Peruand later in time when referring to the viceroyalties of New Granada and Río de la Plata. Insuch kingdoms, a viceroy held the power as the representative of the royal authority directlyappointed by the king himself. See L. Weckmann, The medieval heritage of Mexico. NewYork 1992, 337-338.


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human laboratory as expressed by Gruzinski and Bernard,2 in which Spain improviseda system of maritime commerce without precedent and ordered a transoceanic empirethat included the emerging societies of the continent, bringing about the diffusion ofEuropean culture in the New World.3

This extended historical period came to an end (at least politically speaking) duringthe first two decades of the nineteenth century, when the wars of independence startedsimultaneously all over Spanish America, giving way to the formation of most ofthe current independent Hispanic American nations. The case of Brazil offers adifferent situation, because the country belonged to Portuguese and not to SpanishAmerica, having its own historical development. Therefore, Brazilian book studieswill not be reviewed in the present article. Regarding the nineteenth century, it wasan agitated period for the whole Hispanic America. For decades the young nationshad similar problems such as the consolidation of their national identities, theformation of their governing bodies and political parties, fights between conservativesand liberals as well as facing civil wars and foreign invasions. Finally, from the lastdecades of the nineteenth century onwards the liberal Republics in the regionwitnessed the modernisation and further development of their economies andinstitutions and the consolidation of the modern nation states. However, along withthe incorporation of modernity, several military regimes and dictatorships hit theregion throughout the twentieth century, exacerbating the deep social differencesthat have survived up to present day as one of the major challenges for the region.

An overview of the Spanish American presses during the ancien regime

Transference of European culture to the New World included the establishment ofthe first European type of printing press outside the Old Continent, which was setup inMexico City on June 12, 1539 when a contract was signed between the Germanprinter Johann Cromberger and his Italian press operator Giovanni Paoli (known inSpanish as Juan Pablos), both residents in Seville, in order to establish a printingoffice in Mexico City, capital of the newly established Viceroyalty of New Spain.4

The first of its type in the New World.5

After Mexico City, other urban centres throughout Spanish America boastedprinting shops during the colonial period, being usually capitals of administrativeunits such as viceroyalties or audiences, as well as important ports or regional centres.The rich city of Lima, capital of the Viceroyalty of Peru hosted the second printingpress in the New World (1584); in 1593 a printing press was established in Manila,and although

2 C. Bernard, S. Gruzinski,Historia del Nuevo Mundo del Descubrimiento a la Conquista. Laexperiencia Europea, 1492-1550. Vol. 1, Mexico 1996, 9.

3 I. Leonard, ‘Spanish ship-board reading in the sixteenth century’, in: Hispania 32 (1949),53.

4 The Viceroyalty of New Spain was the first established in Spanish America (1535). It includednot only presentMexico, but also vast areas of the present USA (Texas, NewMexico, Arizona,and California), as well as Central American countries such as Guatemala.

5 On Crombergers' editorial activity see: C. Griffin, The Crombergers of Seville. The historyof a printing and merchant dynasty. Oxford 1988.


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the Philippines are not part of Latin America, by that time they were under Spanishrule, and all the maritime communication was done through New Spain (with thefamed Galleon of Manila). Therefore, Manila's press has been somehow consideredas one of those printing shops established within the Spanish Empire.

Figure 1. An example of a book printed inMexico: Hernán Cortés,Historia de Nueva España. México1770. Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague

By the seventeenth century we find presses in two more places: Puebla de losÁngeles, the second most important urban centre in the Viceroyalty of New Spain(1640) and Guatemala City, capital of the homonymous Royal Audience (1660).6

During the following century more towns or even remote Jesuit missions joined theexclusive list of places boasting a printing press in Spanish America. Thanks to theJesuits' efforts, their Missions in Paraguay had their own self-made press (c.1703);followed by Havana, which was one of the most important maritime hubs of thewhole Spanish Empire due to its

6 A Royal Audience was a high court, a collegiate power, which exercised not only judicialand political functions within the Spanish Empire but also administrative and even militarypowers. In Spanish America such institutions took over the civil governments of vast territoriesalong with the viceroy.


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strategic position (1707); Antequera, (present Oaxaca, Mexico), which was animportant regional centre in New Spain (1720); Santa Fe de Bogotá, capital of theviceroyalty of New Granada (1739); The village of Ambato, in the Royal Audienceof Quito, where the Jesuits set up a printing press (1755); Córdoba, present dayArgentina, which was the Jesuits' centre of operations in the vast region of Tucumán(1765); Santiago, capital of the Royal Audience of Chile (1776); the port of BuenosAires, which was going to be the capital of the Viceroyalty of Río de La Plata (1780);Guadalajara, capital of the Royal Audience of New Galicia (1792); and Veracruz,the port of entrance to New Spain (c.1794). Finally, other printing presses wereestablished during the first decades of the nineteenth century, still under Spanishrule. This happened in cities such as Caracas, capital of the homonymous RoyalAudience (1808); the port of Cartagena in the viceroyalty of New Granada - presentColombia - (1809); andMérida, capital of the Intendancy of Yucatán - presentMexico- (1813).7

Figure 2. An example of a book printed in Lima: Nicolas Mastrilo Duran, Sermon en el otavario, quela ilustrissima religion de redemptores celebro a la canonizacion de su primero fundador, y patriarcaSan Pedro Nolasco. Lima 1632. Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague

7 J.T.Medina, La imprenta enMérida de Yucatán, 1813-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904; reprintedin Amsterdam in 1964.


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The first Spanish American bibliographic compilations

It should be noted that in Spanish America access to education - and therefore tohigher European culture - was restricted to the dominant population of Hispanicorigin, which was numerically a minority compared to the abundant Indian, blackand ‘mixed’ population. As a result, the scholarly activity, the circulation of books,the formation of libraries and the cultivation of a taste for reading was, with someexceptions, reserved to the population of Hispanic origin. However, the criollos,those who were born to Spanish parents, were also socially excluded by the Spaniardsby birth, since the highest government posts (such as that of viceroy, archbishops,or oidores of Royal Audiences),8 were exclusively reserved to Spaniards appointedby the Spanish king.Hence, the criollos conceived themselves as inheritors of the European culture

transmitted by their parents, but living in another continent and facing differenthuman experiences, and in someway feeling isolated and resigned to play amarginalrole in the cultural world emanated from Europe. These criollo elites, although aminority in numerical terms, had the intellectual and analytical European tools(language, religion, culture) to face, interpret, understand and assimilate a morecomplex human reality than that of the motherland. However, this dominant groupwas constantly confronted with the fact that despite being the owners of vast lands,they were subject to the policies of the Spanish Crown, which was not alwayswell-informed of the American reality. Finally, the so-called criollismo, the culturalidentity generated by this group, included symbolic and ideological representationsderived from this tense reality within a hierarchical society constantly faced withdelicately balanced situations.9

Within this context, the first bibliographic work that attempted to catalogue theSpanish-American authors or those books related to Spanish America, was writtenby a criollo from the city of Córdoba (present Argentina): Antonio León Pinelo'sEpítome de una biblioteca oriental y occidental, náutica y geográfica (1629).10Definitely, León Pinelo's great merit was to summarise for the first time thebibliographic production regarding the New World (the Philippines included), inwhat can be considered as the first bibliography related to the American continent.11

AsMillares Carlo pointed out, León Pinelomay be deemed the father of the Americanbibliographic studies.12 Themain purpose of Epítome de una bibliotecawas to providereliable studies to contemporary scholars about the American continent and, if

8 The oidor (literally ‘hearer’), was a civil judge and member of a collegiate tribunal, theAudiencia. They represented the king's supreme judicial power. SeeWeckmann, The medievalheritage of Mexico, 337.

9 E. González González, ‘La Universidad en la cultura novohispana del siglo XVII’, in: K.Kohut (ed.), La formación de la cultura virreinal. Vol. II: El siglo XVII. Frankfurt amMain/Madrid 2004, 346.

10 A. de León Pinelo, Epítome de una biblioteca oriental y occidental, náutica y geográfica.Madrid: Juan González, 1629.

11 J.J. Eguiara y Eguren, Biblioteca Mexicana Repr. Mexico 1986, 187.12 A.Millares Carlo, El Epitome de Pinelo, primera bibliografía del NuevoMundo. Washington

1958, 27.


possible, to stimulate the interest in American-related topics.13 León Pinelo's Epítomewas the starting point of the Spanish-American bio-biblio-

13 At that time León Pinelo was working in Spain where he was related to one of the mostimportant governing bodies of the Spanish Crown, the Council of the Indies based in Seville.See: L. Hachim Lara, ‘De León Pinelo a Beristain: ensayo sobre la tradición de los repertoriosliterarios hispanoamericanos’, in: Revista Chilena de literatura 59 (2001), 141.


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graphic genre, mainly produced by American criollo scholars, which increasinglybecame a vindication of their own culture against the allegedly superiority of theSpaniards due to the misconception of the general backwardness of the Americancontinent.14

Possibly the best example of these bio-bibliographies is the unfinished BibliothecaMexicana (1755) written in Latin by the cleric Juan José de Eguiara y Egurén, whowanted to highlight the abundance of remarkable scholars that were born in or thathad been active in the Viceroyalty of New Spain (including also some references tothe Viceroyalty of Peru) and their works (in print and manuscript). The work wasessentially a refutation of the slanderous affirmation of the Spaniard Manuel Martí,dean of the cathedral of Alicante, who considered the intellectual and academicactivity produced in the New World as backward and without any kind of academicmerit. As a result, the Bibliotheca Mexicana is a repertory of the underestimatedscientific, literary, philosophic and religious knowledge produced and printed inHispanic America, specifically in New Spain.15 The work not only shows the vasterudition displayed by Eguiara but also his clear intention to vindicate the honourand letters of his fatherland, as illustrated by this beautiful quote:

Oh, if only the printing houses of Lyon in France, of Antwerp, Louvain,Venice and other such cities were as close to our lands as the sun! Whatan abundance of books would Europe enjoy - their ranks swollen with allmanner of literature, notable for their variety, adorned to perfection,wonderfully finished and as if burnished to serve as a mirror reflecting therays of that sun? The Holy Spirit did not pour forth his divine science withsuch lavish generosity over one part only of this world, but over all.16

In the same vein, some other eighteenth-century authors left bio-bibliographiccatalogues, such as Antonio de Alcedo y Bejarano, historian from Quito with hisBibliotheca Americana (1791), which was only published in the twentieth century.In his work, Alcedo provided a repertory of works related to the American continent,written in different languages, as well as the biographies of the authors.17 The workhas been considered a systematic, scientific bibliographic tool, which was inaccordance with the Enlightenment's desire to systematise knowledge. Furthermore,directly inspired on Eguiara's unfinished Bibliotheca Mexicana, José MarianoBeristain y Souza, another cleric from New Spain, wrote his BibliotecaHispanoamericana Septentrional, started in 1796 and published in three volumesbetween 1816 and 1821, also in the form of a modern bio-bibliography.18 Beristain's

14 E. González González, ‘La Universidad en la cultura novohispana del siglo XVII’, 339.15 Eguiara y Eguren, BibliotecaMexicana. The work is preceded by 20 prologues or anteloquia.

See the Spanish translation: J.J. De Eguiara y Egurén, Prólogos a la Biblioteca Mexicana.Repr. Mexico 1996.

16 Eguiara y Eguren, Biblioteca Mexicana. Repr. Mexico 1986, vol. 1, 137.17 A. De Alcedo y Bejarano, Bibliotheca Americana. Catálogo de los autores que han escrito

sobre la América en diferentes idiomas y noticias de su vida y patria, años en que vivierony obras que escribieron. Repr. Quito 1964.

18 J.M. Beristain y Souza, Biblioteca Hispano-americana Septentrional. 3 vols., Mexico1816-1821.


vast bibliography is the last one written during the colonial period as part of thisseries produced by criollos and intended to positively


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strengthen the identity of the Hispanic American people highlighting the culturaloutput generated in the viceroyalties.

The creation of national bibliographic repositories

After the Independence from Spain and the foundation of the Republican system inmost of the Latin American new countries (with occasionally brief monarchicalattempts), it was mandatory to develop and consolidate the national identities andthe power of the State. As part of this process, the new republican regimes favoredthe creation of national libraries, that not only secured the national bibliographicpatrimonies, but were also in accordance with the modern nineteenth-centuryEuropean standards of civilisation, being considered as symbols of culturalachievement.19 In November 1868, Manuel Payno, aMexican writer and intellectual,published an article entitled ‘La gran biblioteca nacional’, in which he argued aboutthe importance of such institutions in modern and civilised societies in these terms:

That such an institution [a national library] is indispensable in a civilisedsociety, as necessary as food, no one doubts. Thus, what should be doneis not to collect books without taste, with neither criterion nor discernment,in humble, dark quarters distant from the centre of the cities, but to erecta dignified grand monument to inspire the august ideas of scholarship andof scientific inquiry.20

Argentina was the first nation to officially establish a National Library in BuenosAires (1810), which was founded by decree of the first governing board of the newRepublic. It was followed by neighboring Chile (1813) and Uruguay (1815). Shortlyafter independence had been declared, the government of Peru signed a decree onthe foundation of its National Library in 1821. The case of Peru's National Libraryoffers a notable example of the impact of armed conflicts on bibliographic repositories.During the War of the Pacific (1879-1883), Chile confronted Peru and Bolivia forcontrol of mineral rich areas. The Chilean troops occupied Lima in 1881 and lootedthe National Library, taking with them thousands of books to Santiago. Recently theChilean government has returned some thousands of books to Peru.21

Other countries were to follow. In 1822 the Colombian government reorganisedthe Royal Library that had been created in 1777 with Jesuit collections, and whichwas reopened as the National Library of Colombia in 1823. In the following decadeother countries also established their own national libraries. Such was the case ofVenezuela

19 P. Jones, ‘Indispensable in a civilized society. Manuel Payno's Las Bibliotecas de México’,in: Libraries & the cultural record 42, 3 (2007), 270.

20 M. Payno, ‘Las bibliotecas de México’, in: El semanario ilustrado 2 (1868). Quotedand translated into English in Jones, ‘Indispensable in a civilized society’, 280.

21 ‘Chile returns looted Peru books’, www.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7082436.stm (retrieved 22January 2013).


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(1833). In the case of Mexico, the National Library was originally founded also in1833, but it was only established definitely in 1867 after several unsuccessful attempts.The Central American nations followed the rest of the region in the second half ofthe century: Guatemala (1879) and Costa Rica (1888).In order to provide collections to the newly created national libraries, the republican

governments of several countries (Chile, Peru, Colombia and Mexico, for instance)assumed control over the rich Jesuit libraries (the Society of Jesus had been expelledfrom all Spanish possessions in 1767), incorporating them into the national collectionsand charging intellectuals with collecting and caring for the books.22 In Mexico, withthe proclamation of the ‘Reform Laws’ (1859-1860), all church properties werenationalised in order to weaken the financial hold the church had on Mexico. Thus,virtually all the rich clerical libraries were integrated into the National Library andother State collections. Eventually, the Latin American national libraries becamelarger and richer thanks to private donations of intellectuals and book collectors.Finally the legal deposit of books was also implemented (e.g. in Chile in 1820 andin Mexico in 1846).

Nineteenth-century national bibliographies

Nineteenth-century Latin American intellectuals, who, to a great extent, were underthe influence of the European currents of thought (specially from the second half ofthe century), were increasingly interested in the production of nationalhistoriographies, since these works laid the basis for the construction of a nationalpast.23 Historical production was considered a decisive cohesive element in theformation of national identities. Multifaceted learned men, typical examples ofnineteenth-century erudition, undertook this essential task by publishing corpora ofhistorical documents and works on national history.In line with this, the history of the domestic printing press and its output in Latin

America was one of the relevant topics during the second half of the century all overthe region, as proved by the works of several historians such as the Argentinian JuanMaría Gutiérrez's Bibliografia de la primera imprenta de Buenos Aires: desde sufundación hasta el año de 1810 (1866); the Colombian Pedro María Ibáñez's Laimprenta en Bogotá: desde su introducción hasta 1810 (1898); the Ecuadorian clericand historian Federico González Suárez's Bibliografía ecuatoriana (1892); and theMexican historians, Joaquín García Icazbalceta's Bibliografía Mexicana del SigloXVI (1886) and Vicente de Paula Andrade's Ensayo bibliográfico mexicano del sigloXVII (1899).24

22 Jones, ‘Indispensable in a civilized society’, 280.23 See, for instance: H.MoralesMoreno, ‘Las ideas políticas sobre la nación en América Latina

durante la segunda mitad del siglo XIX’, in: Revista de historia de América 132 (2003), 55-74.24 J.M. Gutiérrez, Bibliografia de la primera imprenta de Buenos Aires: desde su fundación

hasta el año de 1810. Buenos Aires 1886; P.M. Ibáñez, La imprenta en Bogotá: desde suintroducción hasta 1810. Guayaquil 1898; F. González Suárez, Bibliografía ecuatoriana:la imprenta en el Ecuador durante el tiempo de la colonia 1750-1792. Quito 1892; J. GarcíaIcazbalceta, Bibliografía Mexicana del siglo XVI. Catálogo razonado de impresos enMéxico


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Figure 3. Joaquín García Icazbalceta, Bibliografia mexicana del siglo XVI. Mexico 1954. Photo:Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague

However, the first scholar who provided a complete detailed overview of the outputof Latin American printing presses during the whole colonial period was the Chileanhistorian and bibliographer José ToribioMedina. His copious bibliographic catalogueswere printed from 1891 to 1908 and reprinted several times. Medina's extensive andexhaustive research is classified by cities or viceroyalties that hosted a printing press,covering the printing press history in Argentina, his native Chile, Colombia, Cuba,Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay and Uruguay, Peru, the Philippines, andVenezuela.25

de 1539 a 1600. Mexico 1886; V.P. Andrade, Ensayo bibliográfico mexicano del siglo XVII.Mexico 1899; Ensayo bibliográfico mexicano del siglo XVIII. Mexico 1899.

25 J.T. Medina, Historia y bibliografía de la imprenta en el antiguo Virreinato del Río de LaPlata: epítome 1705-1810. Santiago de Chile 1890; La imprenta en Santiago de Chile desdesus orígenes hasta febrero de 1817. Santiago de Chile 1891; La imprenta en Bogotá,1739-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprenta en Cartagena de Indias, 1809-1820. Santiagode Chile 1904; La imprenta en La Habana, 1707-1810. Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprentaen Guatemala, 1660-1821. Santiago de Chile 1910; La imprenta en México, 1539-1821.Seville 1893; La imprenta en Guadalajara, 1793-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprentaen Mérida de Yucatán, 1813-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprenta en Oaxaca,1720-1820. Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprenta en Puebla de los Ángeles, 1640-1821.Santiago de Chile 1908; La imprenta en Veracruz, 1794-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904;Historia y bibliografía de la imprenta en el antiguo Virreinato del Río de La Plata: Historiade la imprenta en Paraguay (1705-1727), en Montevideo (1807-1810). La Plata 1892; Laimprenta en Lima. Epítome, 1584-1810. Santiago de Chile 1890; La imprenta en Arequipa,Cuzco, Trujillo y otros pueblos del Perú durante la campaña de la independencia 1820-1825.Santiago de Chile 1904; La imprenta en Manila desde sus orígenes hasta 1810. Santiago deChile 1896; La imprenta en Caracas, 1808-1821. Santiago de Chile 1904.


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It may therefore be affirmed that from the last quarter of the nineteenth century andthrough the first three decades of the twentieth century, Latin American bibliographicstudies were focused on the study of the bibliographic patrimony printed by domesticpresses, as well as on the history of those national printing presses. Nearly all theseworks were somehow inspired by Toribio Medina's research. See, for instance, thestudies regarding Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico,Peru, the Philippines, Uruguay, and Venezuela.26

Early twentieth century new approaches

In consonance with this positivist distinctive spirit of the turn of the century, newscientific approaches also aroused the interest of Latin American scholars, such asthe classification of local editions according to modern scientific disciplines27 andthe study and republication of manuscripts printed by Hispanic America's presses inthe indigenous languages of the continent, mainly during the colonial period. Thesewere normally liturgical or grammatical works written by monks (Franciscans,

26 Regarding Argentina: L.R. Fors, Indice cronológico de los trabajos ejecutados en la imprentade los niños expósitos de Buenos Aires durante los siglos XVIII y XIX que existen en laBiblioteca Pública Provincial de La Plata. La Plata 1904; C. Heras, Los primeros trabajosde la imprenta de Niños Expósitos. La Plata 1930; J. Canter, La imprenta de los NiñosExpósitos en 1820 y 1821. Buenos Aires 1931. Regarding Chile: J. Vicuña Cifuentes,Contribución a la historia de la imprenta en Chile. Santiago de Chile 1903; M. Bianchi, Laimprenta en Chile. Santiago de Chile 1936. Regarding Colombia: E. Posada, La imprentaen Santa Fé de Bogotá en el siglo XVIII. Madrid 1917; G. Otero Muñoz, Historia delperiodismo en Colombia: desde la introducción de la imprenta hasta el fin de la ReconquistaEspañola (1737-1819). Bogotá 1925. Regarding Cuba: L.M. Pérez, Impresos de la RealSociedad Patriótica y del Real Consulado de La Habana y adiciones a la imprenta en LaHabana de José Toribio Medina. La Habana 1907. Regarding Ecuador: C.E. Sánchez, Laimprenta del Ecuador: en conmemoración del IV centenario de la fundación de Quito:1534-1934, y el primer centenario de la imprenta nacional. Quito 1935. RegardingGuatemala:J.E. O'Ryan, Bibliografía de la imprenta en Guatemala. Santiago de Chile 1897; V.M. Díaz,Historia de la imprenta en Guatemala. Guatemala 1930; G. Valenzuela, La imprenta enGuatemala: algunas ediciones a la obra que con este título publicó en Santiago de Chile(...) José Toribio Medina. Guatemala 1933. Regarding Mexico: N. De León, BibliografíaMexicana del siglo XVIII. 5 vols., Mexico 1902-1908; id., La imprenta en México: ensayohistórico y bibliográfico. Mexico 1900; J.B. Iguíniz, La imprenta en la Nueva Galicia1793-1821. Mexico 1911; see also A. Millares Carlo, Ensayo de una bibliografía debibliografías mexicana. Mexico 1943. Regarding Peru: R.Moreno (ed.), Biblioteca peruana:apuntes para un catálogo de impresos. 2 vols., Santiago de Chile 1896; C. Prince, Labiblioteca peruana en la exposición universal de París de 1900. Lima 1900; id., Suplementoa la biblioteca peruana colonial. Lima 1912. Regarding the Philippines: W.E. Retana, Laimprenta en Filipinas: Adiciones y observaciones a la imprenta enManila de D.J.T. Medina.Madrid 1899. Regarding Uruguay: E. Dado, Historia y bibliografía de la imprenta enMontevideo 1810-1865. Montevideo 1912; J. Torre Revello, Contribución a la historia dela imprenta en Montevideo. Buenos Aires 1926. Regarding Venezuela: M.S. Sánchez, Laimprenta de la expedición libertadora: capítulo de la obra en preparación: historia ypreparación de la imprenta en Venezuela. Caracas 1916.

27 N. De León, Apuntes para una bibliografía antropológica de México. Mexico 1901; id.,Biblioteca botánico-mexicana. Mexico 1895.


Dominicans and Augustinians) in order to perform the massive Christianisation ofthe Indians, a subject which still attracts much attention from modern scholars.28

Finally, the study of inquisitorial documents related to book history during the

28 J. García Icazbalceta, Apuntes para un catálogo de escritores en lenguas indígenas deAmérica. Mexico 1866; J.T. Medina, Bibliografía en las lenguas Quechua y Aymará. NewYork 1930; id., Bibliografía de la lengua guaraní. Buenos Aires 1930.


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viceroyal period, particularly the rich collection kept at the Archivo General de laNación of Mexico (AGN). These sources provide different kinds of documents, suchas lists of private libraries confiscated by the Inquisition which belonged to people(including book printers) accused of heresy, Lutheranism, Judaism, heterodoxy orwitchcraft. These documents also mention isolated books seized to be reviewed andthe results of the inquisitorial inspections or visitas carried out by inquisitorial officersseeking prohibited books on board the Spanish fleets that yearly arrived at the portof Veracruz. The documentation available covers the period 1575-1600, the rest ofthe series is incomplete or not preserved in the archive. This pioneering and preciouscompilation of inquisitorial documents related to book history in New Spain wasoriginally published by Francisco Fernández del Castillo in Mexico in 1914, underthe name Libros y libreros en el siglo XVI.29 Since then, this book become a classic,as it has enhanced much of the literature on the topic, and it is still an obligatoryreference for contemporary researchers interested in book history during the viceroyalperiod.

Figure 4. José ToribioMedina, Biblioteca Hispano-Americana, 1493-1810. Reprint Amsterdam 1962.Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague

29 See the recent edition: F. Fernández del Castillo, Libros y libreros en el siglo XVI. Repr.Mexico 1982.


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Following this trend, in 1939, with the celebration of the fourth centenary of theestablishment of the printing press in Mexico, the Archivo General de la Naciónpublished 40 inventories of books found among the Inquisition documents. Particularlyinterestingwere thememorials of books presented by seventeenth-century booksellersof Mexico City, whose book lists were requested by the Inquisition in order to havecontrol over the printed stock available in Mexico City book stores (from 1655 to1661).30 Such records still provide material for current research.During the following decades, scholars in Latin America continued to focus their

attention on the study of the local printing presses, as well as on the history of LatinAmerican journalism. In this respect, the work of the Argentinian historian José TorreRevello, El libro, la imprenta y el periodismo en América (Buenos Aires 1940)sparked new interest on the topic. Furthermore, the study of the works of the alreadymentioned criollo scholars such as León Pinelo, Eguiara y Egurén, Beristain y Souzaincreasingly became a subject of study, particularly in Mexico, where the Spanishexiled professor Agustín Millares Carlo developed a line of studies in local bookhistory, focusing on the bio-bibliographies and compilations left by the criollo scholarsand by nineteenth century historians.31

Recent research and professionalisation of bibliographic studies

The new Latin American book historiography has been produced during the last 15years, and it has been strongly influenced by authors such as Roger Chartier andRobert Darnton, who have defined the field of study on book history.32 These twointernationally well-known researchers have established a fruitful exchange of ideaswith Latin American researchers interested in the history of the book, particularlyin Mexico and Argentina, the two most important Latin American editorial centres,where several works by Chartier and Darnton have been translated into Spanish.33

As a result, new approaches have aroused scholars' interests, such as the complexrelations established between readers and books - not only during the viceroyal orcolonial period, but also during the nineteenth century -, as well as the circulation,reception and diffusion of written culture. In this vein, Mexico is the country where

30 E. O'Gorman, ‘Bibliotecas y librerías coloniales 1585-1694’, in: Boletín del Archivo Generalde la Nación 10 (1939), 661-1006.

31 A. Millares Carlo, Ensayo de una bibliografía de bibliografías mexicanas la imprenta, ellibro, las bibliotecas. Mexico 1943.

32 C. Castañeda, ‘Prólogo’, in: id. (ed.), Del autor al lector. I. Historia del libro en México, II.Historia del libro. Mexico 2002, 7.

33 Regarding Roger Chartier's works see: R. Chartier, Cultura escrita, literatura e historia.Coacciones transgredidas y libertades restringidas. Conversaciones de Roger Chartier.Mexico 1999; El juego de las reglas: lecturas. Buenos Aires 2000; Escribir las prácticas:Foucault, De Certeau, Marin. Buenos Aires 1996; Sociedad y escritura en la EdadModerna.Mexico 1995. Regarding Robert Darnton's works see: R. Darnton, Edición y subversión.Literatura clandestina en el Antiguo Régimen. Mexico 2003; El coloquio de los lectores.Ensayos sobre autores, manuscritos, editores y lectores. Mexico 2003; Los best-sellersprohibidos en Francia antes de la revolución. Mexico 2008; El beso de Lamourette.Reflexiones sobre historia cultural. Buenos Aires 2010; El negocio de la Ilustración. Historiaeditorial de la Encyclopédie, 1775-1800. Mexico 2011.


the largest amount of studies directly influenced by Chartier and Darnton have beenproduced, possibly due to the rich archives and libraries of the country available for


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researchers.34 The study of private libraries as sources for historians has also beenextensively researched since the 1970s in several countries of the region such asMexico, Peru, Chile, Argentina, and Venezuela.35

Moreover, Mexico was the first Latin American country that established an institutespecifically devoted to book research, the Instituto de Investigaciones Bibliográficas(IBB), as one of the research institutes of the National University of Mexico (UNAM).The institute was created in 1967 and is directly linked to the National Library ofMexico. The main lines of investigation focus on bibliographical, bibliological,hemerographical and archival studies, as well as on librarianship. Thus, the instituteis directly responsible for the study, preservation and administration of the collectionsstored at the National Library and the National Periodicals Library. In fact, theNational Library in Mexico is related to the National University, and is not anindependent institution like in most countries. The academic staff organise symposia,colloquia, exhibitions and activities related to bibliographical studies. The institutealso boast a journal and publishes books on regular basis.36

In Argentina the Instituto de Investigaciones Bibliográficas y Crítica Textual(IIBCRIT) was created in 1978. Its main purpose is the study of problems andmethodsrelated to text editions and textual criticism of all the Spanish-language worksproduced either in Spain or in Latin America from the Middle Ages until presentday.37

Future perspectives

34 See the different studies compiled in works like Castañeda,Del autor al lector; M.P. GutiérrezLorenzo (ed.), Impresos y libros en la historia económica de México (siglos XVI-XIX).Guadalajara 2007; I. García Aguilar [et al.], Leer en tiempos de la colonia: imprenta,bibliotecas y lectores en la Nueva España. Mexico 2010; M. Garone Gravier (ed.),Miradasa la cultura del libro en Puebla. Bibliotecas, tipógrafos, grabadores, libreros y edicionesen la época colonial. Mexico/Puebla 2012.

35 Regarding Mexico see L. Coudart [et al.], ‘Las bibliotecas particulares del siglo XVIII: unafuente para el historiador’, in: Secuencia: revista de historia y ciencias sociales del Institutode Investigaciones Dr. José María Luis Mora 56 (2003), 173-191; R. Diego Fernández,‘Biblioteca del oidor de la audiencia de la Nueva Galicia Joseph Manuel de la garza falcón(1763)’, in: AnuarioMexicano de historia del derecho 11-12 (1999-2000), 91-160; C. GómezÁlvarez [et al.], Una biblioteca obispal, Antonio Bergosa y Jordán, 1802. Puebla 1997; C.Gómez Álvarez [et al.], Un hombre de estado y sus libros. El obispo Campillo, 1740-1813.Mexico/Puebla 1997; I. Osorio Romero, Historia de las bibliotecas Novohispanas. Mexico1986. Regarding Peru see T. Martínez Hampe, Bibliotecas privadas en el mundo colonial:la difusión de libros e ideas en el virreinato del Perú (siglos XVI-XVII). Frankfurt 1996; P.Guivobich Pérez, ‘Bibliotecas de médicos en Lima colonial’, in: Castañeda, Del autor allector, 293-304. Regarding Chile see A. Dougnac Rodríguez, ‘Reforma y tradición en laBiblioteca de un obispo ilustrado de Chile. El caso de Francisco José deMarán (1780-1807)’,in: Revista Chilena de historia del derecho 16 (1990-1991), 579-618. Regarding Argentinianscholars see D. Ripodas Ardanaz, ‘Bibliotecas privadas de funcionarios de la Real Audienciade Charcas’, in:Memoria del Segundo Congreso Venezolano de Historia. Caracas 1975, vol.2, 499-555. Finally, regarding Venezuela see I. Leal, Libros y bibliotecas en Venezuelacolonial, 1633-1767. Caracas 1979.

36 See the internet site www.iib.unam.mx.37 See the internet site www.iibicrit-conicet.gov.ar.


The recent commemoration of the bicentennial of the independences of most of theSpanish speaking countries of the region, which were mostly celebrated in 2010,sparked fresh interest in the study of the bibliographical production of the nineteenthcentury.


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Thus, the studies of nineteenth-century written culture are expected to experience asteady growth within the following years.38

Moreover, the bibliographical studies and the journalistic production related tothe social, artistic and political movements of the twentieth century such as theMexican Revolution or the dictatorships in countries like Chile, Argentina andUruguay, the Cuban Revolution, the guerrillas in Central America or Colombia arebecoming increasingly popular within scholarly circles.Regarding the preservation of national bibliographic patrimonies, Mexican

institutions have recently made considerable progress in cataloguing the copiousnational bibliographic patrimony amassed throughout the colonial period and thenineteenth century. Thus, the foundation has been laid for Mexican institutions toperform professional cataloguing. Several Mexican libraries have done excellentworks of cataloguing, such as the Library José María Lafragua of the BeneméritaUniversidad of Puebla (BUAP), the Franciscan Library of Cholula of the Universityof Las Américas (UDLA), the sixteenth-century collection of the Public Library ‘JuanJosé Arreola’ of Guadalajara, as well as the Library of the Universidad Michoacanaof San Nicolás Hidalgo in Morelia (UMICH).Moreover, the work done by ADABI (Apoyo al desarrollo de archivos y bibliotecas

deMéxico) in the restoration, preservation, research and diffusion ofMexican archivesand libraries had included the cataloguing of major collections such as the Palafoxianaof Puebla, the Library of the regional Museum of Querétaro, the Library of theNational Museum of the Viceroyalty in Tepotzotlán, the Library of the Museum ofZinacantepec and the Library Armando Carrillo Olivares of the University ofGuanajuato among many others.39

However, there is still a lot of work to do not only in Mexico, but also in Bolivia,Ecuador, Guatemala and Peru. All of these countries boast rich bibliographiccollections that ought to be properly catalogued. This is certainly one of the mainchallenges in the region: the improvement or creation of institutions focused onresearch, preservation and diffusion of their national bibliographic heritage. Currently,only Mexico and Argentina have made considerable efforts in modern bibliographicresearch.Finally, the importance of Latin American collections is worth stressing, since

they often contain rare and unique items which have been frequently overlooked bythe scholarly community. For this reason, scholars interested in the European printingpress must take into account the existence of rare copies, barely known, available inLatin American collections. To give just an example, eight sets (at least two of themcomplete) of Christophe Plantin's well-known Biblia Políglota are still available inMexican libraries.40 Therefore, the preservation and study of the rich nationalbibliographic patrimony should become of prime importance for the cultural policiesof the Latin American governments.

38 For instance, the Instituto de Investigaciones Bibliográficas inMexico launched the seminary‘Bibliografía Mexicana del Siglo XIX’.

39 The online catalogue of ADABI is available at www.adabi.org.mx.40 This example was provided by a Dutch scholar, Theodor Dunkelgrun, who has researched

copies of the Biblia Políglota in Mexican libraries.


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Adriaan van der WeelPandora's box of text technology

Gathering the dust of ages in libraries and archives around the world, the materialrecord of centuries of book history patiently and quietly awaits the curious seeker.Meanwhile in the world of the contemporary book things have been a great deal lessserene.Digital publishing and e-books have arrived, attended by new business, publishing

and value-chain models. E-books are read on devices that are ‘on the grid 24/7’,creating endless possibilities for dynamic functionality, such as social reading, sharingannotations and experiences. E-books can be enhanced by links to dictionary orencyclopedic entries, or video or audio fragments.As these innovations are transforming the nature of the book, we often hear that

it is ultimately the content that matters; not the ‘mere’ form in which we consumethat content. To book historians this seems a rather ingenuous belief. As we know,an entire arsenal of paratextual elements lies always in readiness to be employed inthe production of a text. They are deliberately selected by editors, printers, andpublishers to lend the text's final appearance a particular connotation. Digitalproduction adds to this existing arsenal an array of additional possibilities, furtherwidening the range of reader experiences, and the range of meaning the text maytake on. Indeed, the choice between paper and digital production and disseminationis itself a meaningful one.So in a digitising world, the concept of the book is proving more transient than it

ever was on paper. But the consequences of the digital transformation do not endthere. Libraries are being overtaken by an acute identity crisis as Web-basedalternative ways of finding relevant information, such as Library Thing andGoodreads, Google Books and Elsevier's Science Direct, Amazon and the iBookstore,are vieing for patrons' time and attention. Publishing is becoming a free-for-all, withtech companies, libraries, museums, archives, governments and private individualsall thronging to claim their part of the cake. Bookshops are disappearing, as shoppingis swept up in the unprecedented wave of mediatisation that is washing over our dailylives.In this perfect storm of Internet and WWW the position of the long-form book,

paper or digital, is proving less stable than it was once thought to be. The new digitalsubstrates for the creation, preservation, and dissemination of text are engendering


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new and very different reading practices. Yes, more people are reading more thanever in history, but brief, disconnected fragments rather than long discursive texts.And if long discursive texts are read digitally, the technology invites them to be readfragmentarily, interrupted by the siren calls of status updates andWhatsAppmessages,if not by the ‘passages from the book that mention the idea, person, or topic you'reinterested in’ helpfully highlighted for you in advance by Amazon Kindle's X-Rayfunction. It is certainly true that a tablet can be used for immersive reading no lessthan a printed book; it is just a great deal less likely that it will be. Distraction is builtinto the device - and may well be built increasingly into the very text.In these circumstances I wonder if it isn't perhaps naive to maintain that the form

in which we consume our reading does not matter. Isn't that notion just as misguidedas the notion that ‘technology is just a set of tools’, that it isn't the technology thatmakes the difference, but the use we make of it? Under the suggestive title ‘Are webecoming cyborgs?’ the New York Times not long ago published a striking exampleof this mantra being repeated several times in a single discussion by three prominentthinkers about new technology: Susan Greenfield, Evgeny Morozov, and MariaPopova.1 Greenfield fears that ‘we are heading toward a short attention span and apremium on sensationalism rather than on abstract thought and deeper reflection’,but says that ‘what concerns me is not the technology in itself, but the degree towhich it has become a lifestyle in and of itself rather than a means to improving yourlife’. Popova: ‘My concern is really not ... the degree to which technology is beingused, but the way in which we use it.’ Morozov: ‘[W]e have to be very careful notto criticize the whole idea of technological mediation. We only have to set limits onhow far this mediation should go, and how exactly it should proceed.’To ‘critise the whole idea of technological mediation’ would be pointless, and

very silly. But that does not mean we should not critically examine how it may affectus and why it may affect us the way it does. The history of the book - of authorship,printing, publishing and reading - has always been intimately bound up withintellectual history. Especially since the French ‘annales’ school of history, it hasbeen one of the central pursuits of book history to map how the history of cultureand ideas, the history of scientific discoveries and inventions, and our social history,have all been intimately connected with the history of print culture. However, bookhistorians have also been divided about the extent of a causal connection betweenthe history of print technology and intellectual history. Most have been just as waryof attributing any form of agency to technology as Greenfield, Morozov, and Popova.This attitude is understandable enough. It makes sense to assume that by virtue of

being the inventors of the technnology we must be in control of it, deciding if andhow we use it. Yet I think the assumption may be based on wishful thinking. This iscertainly what the countless myths and stories about technology running out of handthat can be found in all cultures at all times are warning us for. In the myth of Pandoraand her box; Prometheus and the fire of the gods; the sorcerer's apprentice; The golemof Prague; Frankenstein, and so on, technology seduces the protagonist with thepromise

1 ‘Are we becoming cyborgs?’, New York Times, 30 November 2012.


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of somehow enhancing a particular human capability only to then turn against him.In most cases this atavistic fear takes the shape very literally of an inanimate objectbecoming animated.A particularly fascinating example that clearly belongs in this category of warning

tales is Plato's dialogue Phaedrus, where Plato has Socrates discuss writing in verymuch the same terms as Pandora's box. Writing too, Socrates believes, is capable oftaking on a life of its own, out of control of its author. Not only is the technologybeguiling because it takes over or makes easier a task that would cost us more timeor energy or other resources (in the case of script, for example memorising factualknowledge or fictional narratives). It also has inherent properties, or affordances,that suggest how it is likely to be used. In the case of writing probably the mostobvious one is carrying a record to another place or time, obviating the need tomemorise it. In having Thamus call attention to themedium's unintended consequenceof a collective loss of memory Plato proved himself a very early and very perceptive‘media critic’. Plato forefelt that writing, which could fall into the hands of anynumber of unspecified anonymous, and not necessarily well-informed, readers, wouldchange the nature of human communication forever. Plato deplored this, but ultimatelythe issue is not whether we regard this change as ‘good’ or ‘bad’ but simply that weacknowledge that it happened.The technology of digital textuality (and digital media at large) holds out even

more beguiling promises of convenience than did writing. As in the case of writing,social acceptance is so widespread that it is hardly possible for individuals to evadeits use.2 And like writing it comes with all sorts of inherent properties that stand tomake their mark on human communication.I would therefore like to propose two things. Firstly, as I have suggested before,3

we should extend bibliography, and book studies, to include all written texts, evenif they are not in the form of print.We can and should use the methods of bibliographyand book studies to study the book in its ever evolving digital guises. As Alan Galeyhas recently again reminded us, ‘bibliography's unity lies in method and mindset,not in materials’.4 This is also useful as a form of ‘applied history’. Each materialsubstrate, from clay, inscriptions, and scrolls, to the digital text forms, has its ownaffordances. Contrasting the inherent characteristics and affordances of digital textforms with those of, for example, the print medium will elucidate the nature andextent of the current developments. Reversely, observations and insights about theradically different nature of digital textuality will also present a vantage point for abetter understanding of the print paradigm and the Order of the Book5 and help usbreak through the persistent myth of textual transparency. Regarded sub speciemutationis the material evi-

2 Recently Jennifer A. Chandler has given a very persuasive account of the mechanism of such‘social enforcement’: J.A. Chandler, ‘“Obligatory technologies”. Explaining why people feelcompelled to use certain technologies’, in: Bulletin of science, technology& society 32 (2012)4, 255-264.

3 A. van der Weel, ‘Bibliography for the new media’, in: Quoerendo 35 (2005) 1-2, 96-108.4 A. Galey, ‘The enkindling reciter. E-books in the bibliographical imagination’, in: Book

history 15 (2012), 210-247; 217.5 I explain the term in Changing our textual minds. Towards a digital order of knowledge.

Manchester 2011, 67-103.


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dence of the history of the book that continues to lie undisturbed and apparentlyunchanged in libraries and archives will take on new and surprising meaning.Secondly, I suggest that as book historians we allow ourselves to entertain - if

only as a hypothesis - the idea that after a certain point in its evolution technologyshapes society more than society shapes technology. Already there is clear evidencethat the digital media are having an effect on our reading habits. The suggestion isstrong that this may have cognitive effects, and whatever we may think about them,these are certainly unplanned. As we have seen in the case of writing and printing,changing our dominant textual medium also changes our mindset, but not by design.The point of this is not to suggest that digital text technologies (or digital

technologies at large) are bad for us. This is precisely one criticism often levelled atPlato's assessment of writing: that his attitude is that of a culture pessimist. We allhate to be thought Luddites. As we just saw in the case of theNew York Times article,modern commentators fall over backwards denying that they are cultural pessimists.Instead, they maintain, it is merely a matter of setting limits to its use. However, theeagerness not to be cast in the feared role of the technophobe threatens to make usmiss the point. Suggesting that technology has a certain sway over us is not tantamountto believing that we will all become dumber;6 merely that the dominant mediums,including the dominant textual medium, will affect the way we think more deeplythan we realise or apparently wish to know - without anyone planning for this tohappen. What all the technology-run-out-of-control myths are about is that wherewe fail spectacularly is precisely in setting limits: in controlling the technology.Instead of attacking, denying or glorifying the potential effects of the technology,we would do better to acknowledge the limitations of our control, and study themechanisms involved.The point is also not to be unduly technologically determinist. Of course it's humans

who adopt, or don't adopt, technologies. The discovery of a technology's usefulnessand uses is a social process. However, it is one that is to a large extent confined bythat technology's inherent properties. The properties inherent in technologies willsuggest to what use they are put. Only if we face the possibility that technology mayin that sense have a mind of its own can we hope to influence its further development.How are texts used to transmit culture and knowledge? How does a particular

technological substrate, such as the printed book, affect the content and itsdissemination? What types of texts (and knowledge) does it stimulate? These are allimportant questions in book history. Much more challenging is the question how thismight affect the way we think: our very mentality. How to establish the causal linkbetween the technological properties of a given dominant medium or substrate andsuch farreaching social effects is what I believe the major challenge of book studiesshould be in the digitising decades to come. Asking such questions would certainlymake book studies even more relevant than it already is.

6 As do, for example, M. Bauerlein, The dumbest generation. How the digital age stupefiesyoung Americans and jeopardizes our future. New York 2008, and N.G. Carr, The shallows.What the internet is doing to our brains. New York 2010.


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Jos A.A.M. BiemansBook history and manuscript studies at the University of AmsterdamA personal story

At the website of ProjectMUSE - Book History the editors of the journal Book historypublished a rather broad specification of our scholarly field. ‘Book History is devotedto every aspect of the history of the book, broadly defined as the history of thecreation, dissemination, and reception of script and print. It publishes research onthe social, economic, and cultural history of authorship, editing, printing, the bookarts, publishing, the book trade, periodicals, newspapers, ephemera, copyright,censorship, literary agents, libraries, literary criticism, canon formation, literacy,literary education, reading habits, and reader response.’ Personally, I regard literarycriticism, canon formation and literary education for the greater part as aspects ofphilology and literary history. On the other hand I am inclined to incorporate textualcriticism in this specification, for to those without a good knowledge of book historyand manuscript studies the practise of text editing should be forbidden. Anyway, tome such an extensive and open or including enumeration is preferable to a usuallylimiting or excluding definition, speaking about the mission, the goals etcetera ofthe book history. I think there is no such thing as the book history. Book history inmy view is an extensive scholarly field, more or less divided into many differentplots, often with much ground in common with other disciplines such as philology,art history etcetera, and with numerous bridges between as many plots as possible.The implication of this point of view is that in their activities and publications

scholars in this field should always formulate an operational definition of what theyare doing, or at least explain the specific nature or framework of their book historicalapproach. In this small contribution I will amplify my personal aims with book historyor rather, with manuscript studies. For a clear understanding of the following, someinformation about my position and opportunities may be useful. For many years Ihave had one day a week for teaching and research. Since September 2004, I havespent two days a week on these activities, thanks to the Professor Herman de laFontaine Verwey Foundation in Amsterdam and the Koninklijke Bibliotheek in TheHague, that generously finance my extraordinary professorship in Book History andManuscript Studies. Meanwhile, since the retirement or passing away of somecolleagues, as a professor of palaeography and codicology I have been the Last ofthe Mohicans in our country


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(though at the universities of Groningen, Leiden and Nijmegen courses in manuscriptstudies are taught as well).During the more than twenty-five years of teaching palaeography and codicology

I may of course have stimulated one or two students to become professionalpalaeographers/codicologists. In the Netherlands, however, chances for obtaining anacademic position devoted to this field of scholarship are very few, so each sensiblestudent in Humanities will wisely choose another discipline in order to find a job. Inaddition, we do not have institutions or courses for the education of manuscript andrare book curators, antiquarians and book auctioneers. Acquiring an MA-degree inBook History, however, improves the chance of becoming such a rara avis. Someof my former students indeed fulfil such a position.An annual number of about fifteen BA-students follow my course on the

archaeology of the medieval book. Apart from seven to ten MA-students in BookHistory & Manuscript Studies attending my more advanced lectures there often aresome additional students from departments of classical andmodern languages, historyand art history, both from Amsterdam and elsewhere (including Belgium). Usuallya twenty person table proves to be large enough. Most of the MA-students of courseare medievalists, and all of them show a very special interest in the medieval book.Sometimes we meet a student in physics, medicine or law, interested in the historyof their own discipline and studying medieval sources. Almost every year a PhDstudent in philology or art history pulls up a chair to our table. In short, my teachingis meant for book historians but serves everyone who comes across medieval booksin his or her own field.The kind of research I do and, as a result, the nature of my publications correspond

to my teaching. First of all, I hope to contribute to the development of manuscriptstudies. Secondly, however, and for the greater part I study phenomena that are ofcourse relevant to book history but at the same time prove to be especially importantfor philologists and occasionally art historians. A third subject of research and writingis manuscripts in the possession of the Special Collections of the University ofAmsterdam. The first aspect needs no explanation. The third aspect is also evident:from 1991 to 2011 I was curator of manuscripts at the Special Collections and curatorsare expected to write about their collections. Explaining the second aspect needssome more words.Originally I am both a philologist - specialized in medieval Dutch literature - and

a palaeographer/codicologist. Hence I particularly study the manuscript tradition ofmedieval Dutch literature. For instance, researching some hot items in the editing ofmedieval Dutch texts - the transliteration of medieval i/j (i.e. short respectivelyextended i) and u/v/w to their modern equivalences - made it plausible that thesequestions did not have a linguistic or phonological but a palaeographical backgroundand should be solved from that point of view. Studying both the quantitative andqualitative features of the manuscript tradition of a certain text may reveal the bookhistorical part of its reception during the Middle Ages. To give one example: withregard to the world chronicle by Jacob van Maerlant (c. 1225/1235-c. 1300), one ofthe most important medieval Dutch authors, I studied 64 manuscripts with - parts ofthis text. In a history of Dutch literature Maerlant of course has to be treated as athirteenth-century poet.


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The manuscript tradition, however, surprisingly demonstrates that in the first half ofthe fourteenth century, so post mortem, Maerlant must have been a greater literaryphenomenon than during his lifetime.Finally, I assist anyone who grasps the sleeves of my academic gown. I am happy

to receive the most unexpected and sometimes fascinating questions. The mostinteresting problems come from PhD students, who during their education never gotround to manuscript studies. They all make my life colourful. It is a pleasure to help- and to learn! - and I am usually glad to demonstrate the surplus value ofcodicological research in relation to philological or art historical investigations.

Figure 1. Jos Biemans with some of his students. Photo: Koninklijke Bibliotheek, The Hague


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Samenvattingen

David McKitterick, Het Verenigd Koninkrijk: een nationale geschiedenisvan het boek

De boekgeschiedenis in het Verenigd Koninkrijk is de laatste jaren vooralgedomineerd door de uitgave van de zevendelige reeks Cambridge History of theBook in Britain. Grote projecten als deze hebben nooit de pretentie om volledig ofdefinitief te zijn, maar bijzonder is wel dat dit project gebaseerd is op bronnen dieeerder niet of nauwelijks zijn onderzocht: de bibliografische database ESTC, en nogonaangeroerde archieven van drukkers, uitgevers en boekhandelaren.Het domein van de boekgeschiedenis heeft zich de laatste jaren uitgebreid, en

naast de traditionele aandacht voor drukkers en uitgevers gaat er nu ook specifiekebelangstelling uit naar vragen over overlevering van teksten en naar de geschiedenisvan de smaak. Op welke manier zijn typische en traditionele boekhistorische vragengerelateerd aan vragen over de interpretatie van teksten? Ook is er een groeiendeinteresse voor de overgang vanmanuscript naar gedrukte teksten en bovendien neemtde belangstelling voor internationale aspecten van de boekgeschiedenis toe. In degeschiedenis van bibliotheken en collecties doemen vragen op over de verspreidingvan bibliotheken en daarmee komen we tot de meest prangende vraag van allemaal:wat moet er bewaard worden en wat niet? Wat is er verdwenen? Wat betekent ditvoor het toekomstige onderzoek in de boekgeschiedenis?

Roger Osborne, Om de beurt in Australazië. Geschiedenissen van het boekin Australië en Nieuw-Zeeland

In de afgelopen twee decennia is het onderzoek naar de rol van boeken en anderdrukwerk als betekenisvolle media voor culturele overdracht in Australië enNieuw-Zeeland sterk gestegen. Tot nu toe is dit vooral gebaseerd op analyses vanarchiefmateriaal die zich richten op geschiedschrijving die zich beperkt tot eennationaal, zelfs nationalistisch, discours. Een dergelijk discours is recentelijkbekritiseerd door voorvechters van transnationale geschiedschrijving die de cultureleproductie van Australië en Nieuw Zeeland in een globaal perspectief plaatsen. Dithield gelijke tred met de ontwikkeling van nationale bibliografische databases enandere digitaliseringsprojecten, waardoor de boekgeschiedenis in Australië en NieuwZeeland werd gestimuleerd. Door het plaatsen van grootschalige alternatieventegenover de microstudies die het onderzoek tot nu toe domineerden, vormt dezedigitale omwenteling een uitdaging en een uitbreiding van het veld. Om aan te tonenhoe dit de beoefening van boekgeschiedenis in Australië en Nieuw-Zeeland hetkomende


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decennium kan beïnvloeden, reflecteert dit essay op de belangrijkste boekhistorischewerken uit Australië en Nieuw-Zeeland, resumeert het verscheidene essays dieinspelen op de nationale en empirische fundamenten van het veld en overweegt hetdemethodologische en theoretische uitdagingen van nieuwe studies die gebruikmakenvan transnationale thema's en van digitale mogelijkheden.

Frederick Nesta, Het boek in China en de moderne westerseboekgeschiedenis

Dit artikel geeft een overzicht van lopend onderzoek naar de geschiedenis van hetboek in China. China heeft een lange traditie in boekhistorisch onderzoek, maarnieuwe richtingen, zoals ontwikkeld door Bourdieu en anderen, worden nu zichtbaar.In het artikel ligt de nadruk op Westers onderzoek, omdat dat toegankelijk is voorhen die geen Chinees kunnen lezen en omdat de bredere opzet van dat onderzoek totop zekere hoogte een vergelijking met deWesterse boekcultuur mogelijk maakt. Hetwerk van Westerse geleerden zoals Brokaw, Chow, Chia en Reed wordt tegen hetlicht gehouden om iets te laten zien van de omvang van de Chinese boekgeschiedenisen de mogelijkheden van toekomstig onderzoek.In de negende eeuw kwam het drukken met houtblokken op in China, en dit bleef

het meestgebruikte procedé tot in de late negentiende eeuw. Om te kunnenblokdrukken waren geen grote investeringen of speciale vaardigheden nodig, en hetChinese examensysteem voor ambtenaren ten behoeve van de uitgebreide nationalebureaucratie zorgde voor een grote geletterde bevolking. Het in kaart brengen vande geschiedenis van het boek in China kent de nodige uitdagingen, vooral omdatzoveel verloren is gegaan in de twaalf eeuwen dat er in het land gedrukt wordt,waardoor veel gereconstrueerd moet worden aan de hand van fragmenten. Chia'sonderzoek naar uitgevers in de provincie Fuijan richt zich slechts op drie families,maar die families vertegenwoordigen een traditie die meer dan zeshonderd jaarstandhield.Hoewel de Chinezen ook, eeuwen voor Gutenberg, ‘los’ zetsel uitvonden en

gebruikten, werd het drukkenmet houtblokken er pas aan het eind van de negentiendeeeuw door verdrongen. Westerse missionarissen brachten de drukpers naar Chinaomdat ze hem beschouwden als demeest efficiëntemanier om demiljoenen Chinezente bereiken met hun bijbels en andere publicaties. Nieuwe technologieën maaktendrukken in het Chinees betaalbaar; in zijn zucht naar modernisering begon Chinazijn eigen persen en moderne uitgeverijen te ontwikkelen om kranten en vertalingenvan Westerse teksten te kunnen drukken.

Christine Haug, Slávka Rude-Porubská, Wolfgang Schmitz,‘Buchwissenschaft’ in Duitsland. Een overzicht

Dit essay beschrijft de ontwikkeling van de boekwetenschap in Duitsland als eenacademische discipline. De verschillende instellingen en voorzieningen komen aan


bod, zowel binnen als buiten de universiteiten: gespecialiseerde enonderzoeksbibliotheken, wetenschappelijke verenigingen, het netwerk van deverschillende universiteiten die opleidingen op het gebied van de boekwetenschapaanbieden en de talrijke wetenschappelijke organisaties in de Duitstalige landen. Erwordt verder ingegaan op het onderzoek en publicaties binnen het‘Buchwissenschaft-programma’ op de Ludwig-Maximilians-Universiteit inMünchen.Ook wordt aandacht besteed aan het ‘mission statement’ van de InternationaleBuchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft (IBG) in München die zich voornamelijkbezighoudt met zaken met betrekking tot de hedendaagse boekenmarkt, met detegenwoordige transformatieprocessen in de boekhandel en de gevolgen van deverschuivingen in het gebruik van media.


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Peter R. Frank, Johannes Frimmel & Murray G. Hall, Boekgeschiedenisin Oostenrijk

Als erfgenaam van het immense, multi-etnische Habsburgse rijk voelt de Oostenrijkse(boek)geschiedenis, meer dan in andere landen, de uitdaging van een transnationaleaanpak. In tegenstelling tot ondermeer buurland Duitsland is de boekgeschiedenishier echter niet tot een aparte academische discipline uitgegroeid. Wel bestaat er eengrote bibliografische traditie. Sinds 1998 zorgt de Gesellschaft für Buchforschungvoor een gemeenschappelijk forum voor iedereen die het boek onderzoekt. Eenbelangrijke impuls kwam er ook van de wet op de kunstrestitutie, die zorgde vooreen grote aandacht voor herkomstonderzoek. Door een gebrek aan methodologischediscussie blijft de inbedding van het boekhistorisch onderzoek in decultuurgeschiedenis echter beperkt, en wordt er geen verband gelegd tussen hetbibliografische werk en de sociale geschiedenis, zoals dat in andere landen welgebeurde. De Oostenrijkse situatie is echter juist uitermate geschikt voor eeninternationale blik om, bijvoorbeeld, de relatie tussen de groei van nationaleidentiteiten en de boekdrukkunst te onderzoeken.

Benito Rial Costas, Bibliografie en de geschiedenis van het gedrukte boekin Spanje. Beschouwingen over een oud en een nieuw onderzoeksgebied

Dit artikel beschrijft de geschiedenis van de bibliografie van het gedrukte boek inSpanje evenals haar doelstellingen en benaderingen. Sinds de negentiende eeuwwordt de bibliografie als hulpwetenschap gedoceerd aan vele Spaanse universiteiten.In 1956 besloot de universiteit van Madrid het vak ‘bibliografie van de Spaanseliteratuur’ in te stellen. Deze leerstoel werd ingenomen door José Simón Díaz, eencharismatisch bibliograaf die decennialang een grote invloed op het vakgebied heeftuitgeoefend. In 1979 introduceerde Jaime Moll de bibliografische principes vanFredson Bowers, waardoor er naast pure bibliografie meer belangstelling groeidevoor haar potentieel voor een literair-historische studie van het boek.In de jaren 1983-1984 werd het Tipobibliografía Española-project opgericht. Zijn

doel was de samenstelling van zogenaamde typobibliografieën voor Spanje. Dat zijnspecifieke bibliografieën van bepaalde plaatsen en regio's op het Spaanse grondgebied.In 1987 zag de Asociación Española de Bibliografía het licht. Deze vereniging wildeverscheidene experts met elkaar in contact brengen om zo de studie van het Spaanseboek uit de handpersperiode te bevorderen. Maar de Asociación richtte zich inhoofdzaak op de samenstelling van bibliografieën en catalogi, en sloot daardoor veleonderzoekers uit die een ander en nieuw boekhistorisch onderzoek voorstonden.Uit de traditionele samenwerking tussen bibliografie, bibliotheekwetenschap en

literatuurwetenschap zijn talrijke publicaties voortgekomen. Tegelijkertijd zijn meeren meer historische studies beginnen verschijnen met andere invalshoeken. Dezehandelen over de drukpers, de boekhandel en privébibliotheken, en baseren zich, integenstelling tot het werk van de typobibliografen, naast de boeken zelf ook opverscheidene archiefbronnen. Ze brengen een analyse van het boek binnen een sociale,


politieke, economische en culturele context, maar vaak blijven deze studies door deklassieke typobibliografen ongelezen.Het huidige landschap van de bibliografie in Spanje is diepgaand bepaald door

haar geschiedenis. Het vak blijft sterk verankerd in opleidingen voor bibliotheek- eninformatiewetenschap, en de Tipobibliografía Española gaat nog steeds verder ophet ingeslagen pad. De traditionele typobibliografie blijft het landschap overheersen.Maar er is tegelijk ook een groot gebrek aan een theoretisch kader en voorals nogblijft de vraag onbeantwoord welke richting de bibliografie in Spanje in de toekomstuit wil gaan. Parallel daarmee groeit


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de belangstelling voor nieuwe benaderingen en een nieuw soort onderzoek waarineen bredere geschiedenis van het schrijven, drukken, verkopen en lezen van boekeneen belangrijke plaats bekleedt. Soms is dit onderzoek bibliografisch van aard, maarvaak ook niet. Het lijkt erop dat de tegenstellingen tussen het oude paradigma vande bibliotheek- en literatuurwetenschappen en dat van de breder geörienteerdeboekgeschiedenis aan het vervagen is. Maar de houding die de diepgeworteldediscipline van de Spaanse typobibliografie aanneemt zal voor de toekomst bepalendzijn. Voorals nog is het onduidelijk in welke mate het traditionele vakgebied en denieuwe boekhistorische stromingen in elkaar zullen overvloeien dan wel verder naastelkaar blijven bestaan.

Stijn van Rossem, Boekgeschiedenis in België. Wie huisvest de thuislozen?

Dit paper onderzoekt de boekhistorische verwezenlijkingen in België (met de nadrukop Vlaanderen) van de laatste tien jaar. Het congres Boekgeschiedenis in Vlaanderen.Nieuwe instrumenten en benaderingen uit 2003 dient hiervoor als toetssteen.Verschillende van de inhoudelijke uitdagingen die de Vlaamse en Nederlandseprofessoren boekwetenschap toen naar voren schoven zijn in de tien jaar die volgdenverwezenlijkt. Belgische wetenschappers hebben hun blik verlegd naar eeninternationale horizon, zowel wat betreft methodiek, onderwerp en de verspreidingvan hun onderzoek. De samenwerking tussen Vlaanderen en Wallonië en die tussenBelgië en Nederland intensifieerde, boekhistorische tijdschriftenverwetenschappelijkten en buitenlandse autoriteiten vonden de weg naar Antwerpenen Brussel. De Belgische ‘renaissance’ werd in belangrijke mate gedragen door eennieuwe generatie boekwetenschappers. Deze bijdrage wil er echter voor waarschuwendat deze boost evenwel van korte duur zou kunnen zijn. De belangrijkste verzuchtinguit 2003 is tien jaar later nog steeds niet opgelost. Boekwetenschap heeft immersnog steeds geen institutionele haven gevonden en verliest zelfs terrein. Binnen dewetenschappelijke bibliotheken is er steeds minder plaats voor onderzoek en ook opde Vlaamse universiteiten zijn cursussen boekwetenschap zo goed als onbestaande;een onderzoeksgroep of een opleiding boekwetenschap bestaat al helemaal niet.

Rikard Wingård, Boekhistorisch onderzoek in Zweden, 2006-2012. Eenoverzicht

Dit artikel geeft een overzicht van het boekhistorisch onderzoek in Zweden in delaatste zes jaar en van de instituten en infrastructuur die daarbij betrokken zijn. Deafdeling voor Archieven, Bibliotheken en Musea en Boekgeschiedenis van deuniversiteit van Lund is het belangrijkste centrum; in samenwerking met deuniversiteit van Kopenhagen onderhoudt zij een internetforum voor boekhistorici uitde Scandinavische landen.In het overzicht worden de onderwerpen en resultaten genoemd van belangrijke

publicaties, bundels en artikelen uitgezonderd. De conclusie luidt dat de


boekgeschiedenis als onderwerp een groei doormaakt, zeker als gelet wordt op deaandacht die ze krijgt van jonge onderzoekers. Een groot deel van de besprokenwerken zijn proefschriften die tezamen met de andere studies in dit overzicht demeeste deelgebieden van de boekwetenschap omvatten - auteursonderzoek,leesgeschiedenis, druk- en uitgeverijgeschiedenis, geschiedenis van vormgeving,tekstkritiek, bibliografie etc. Hoewel de ambities zeker niet ontbreken, zouden demogelijkheden voor onderwijs in de boekgeschiedenis kunnen worden verbeterd:cursussen in ande-


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re plaatsen dan Lund en een handboek in het Zweeds en toegespitsts op de Zweedsesituatie zijn desiderata; voor de toekomstige uitbreiding van het boekhistorischonderzoek in Zweden zijn ze noodzakelijk.

Peter Kornicki, Recent onderzoek naar de geschiedenis van het boek inJapan

Dit overzicht vat het onderzoek samen naar de boekgeschiedenis in Japan gedurendehet laatse decennium. Na een korte introductie van enkele belangrijke nieuwedatabases, catalogi en bibliografieën, behandelt de auteur veelbelovendeontwikkelingen op boekhistorisch gebied in de Edoperiode (1603-1868): debestudering van productie en verspreiding van handschriften, van boekconsumptieop het platteland, en van de stroom boeken afkomstig van het Aziatische vasteland.Hoewel Japanse wetenschappers het meeste werk hebben verzet, is een toenemendaantal studies gepubliceerd door Europese en Amerikaanse collega's. Zij hielden zichbijvoorbeeld bezig met marginalia in medische boeken, met boekhandelscatalogi,met de censuur, en met de sociale gevolgen van het drukkersbedrijf. Nieuwe terreinenworden ontgonnen: schrijfsystemen, leesgewoonten, de provenance van boeken enhet gebruik van papier. Het belang van boekgeschiedenis voor de sociale en politiekegeschiedenis is met succes gepropageerd; economische aspecten moet evenwel nogbeter worden onderzocht. Hetzelfde geldt voor de boekcultuur vóór het Edotijdvak,hoewel ook hier wel enige vooruitgang is geboekt.

AinaNøding,Boekgeschiedenis in Noorwegen. Van lezende boeren tot lezersvan Ibsen

De belangstelling voor boekgeschiedenis in Noorwegen is gestaag gegroeid in deafgelopen tien jaar, en het is nu een interdisciplinair onderzoeksveld voor academici,bibliothecarissen en archivarissen uit het hele land. Er is tot op heden geenboekhistorische vereniging; samenwerking is georganiseerd in informele nationaleen internationale netwerken en interdisciplinaire onderzoeksprojecten. Het onderzoekvariëert van kernonderwerpen zoals de geschiedenis van het lezen, de markt voorboeken en bibliotheken, tot censuur, tekstuitgaven en mediageschiedenis, waarboekgeschiedenis één van de mogelijke perspectieven biedt. Studies naar dereceptiegeschiedenis en die van het lezen hebben de meeste aandacht gekregen, naastonderzoek naar de boekhandel.In de laatste jaren is er een tendens om over de nationale grenzen heen te kijken

en vragen naar receptie, verspreiding en de markt voor boeken in een wijdere,internationale context te zien. Voorbeelden zijn onderzoek naar de contemporainereceptie van Ibsens werken op de Europese markt, censuur, de rol van tijdschriftenin de internationale verspreiding van teksten en ideeën, maar ook de geschiedenisvan het lezen in Noorwegen vergeleken met andere landen.


Archie L. Dick, Boekgeschiedenis in Zuid-Afrika. Recente ontwikkelingenen vooruitzichten

Dit artikel biedt een overzicht van de boekgeschiedenis in Zuid-Afrika tussen 2010en 2012. Er wordt ingegaan op belangrijke thema's in de boekwetenschap inZuid-Afrika, waarbij enkele relevante onderzoeksprojecten worden besproken. Erwordt een selectie gegeven van de meest relevante publicaties over boekgeschiedenisdie in de afgelopen tien jaar verschenen. Daarbij wordt ook aandacht besteed aan debijdragen


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van wetenschappers die zichzelf niet in de eerste plaats beschouwen als boekhistorici,maar wier werk wel relevant is voor de boekwetenschap en het boekhistorische veld.

Anders Toftgaard, Vorstelijke bibliotheken, boeken voor de gewone manen de komst van het omslag in de literatuurwetenschap. Trends inboekhistorisch onderzoek in Denemarken

Dit artikel geeft een overzicht van de trends in het lopende boekhistorisch onderzoekin Denemarken. Hoewel de geschiedenis van het Deense boek al sinds de negentiendeeeuw onderzocht wordt, is er sinds het eind van de twintigste eeuw sprake van eenopleving.De twee belangrijkste recente bijdragen tot de Deense boekgeschiedenis zijn de

dissertatiesMenigmands medie (1999) van Henrik Horstbøll en Laesning ogbogmarked i 1600-tallets Danmark (2001) van Charlotte Appel. Beide richten zichop het leesgedrag van de ‘gewone man’ en beide combineren belangstelling voorsociaal-culturele geschiedenis en boekgeschiedenis. Sindsdien zijn er verscheideneandere boekhistorische proefschriften en een handboek verschenen en heeft hetNordisk Forum for Boghistorie zich ontpopt als een levendig platform voor deuitwisseling van ideeën. Het omslag heeft zijn entree gemaakt in deliteratuurwetenschap, in de zin dat een aantal onderzoekers op het snijvlak vanfilologie, tekstwetenschap, literatuursociologie en boekgeschiedenis de functie vanhet omslag en paratekst in de literatuurgeschiedenis onder de loep nemen. Hetonderzoek naar herkomsten is steeds belangrijker geworden in de Kongelige Bibliotekte Kopenhagen en elders. De oorsprong, geschiedenis en teloorgang van een aantalverzamelingen, zoals bijvoorbeeld die van Slot Gottorp, zijn beschreven intijdschriftartikelen en bundels.Een echte vernieuwing in het boekhistorisch onderzoek is de infrastructuur die

samengaat met digitalisering. De Kongelige Bibliotek was de eerste bibliotheek dieeen samenwerking aanging met ProQuest voor de massadigitalisering van oudedrukken voor de Early European Books database. Alle Deense boeken van voor 1601in de collectie van de KB zijn nu online beschikbaar, terwijl alle zeventiende-eeuwseDeense boeken in etappes online komen. Het is te hopen dat de voor het projectverbeterde catalogusbeschrijvingen uiteindelijk zullen leiden tot een vervanging vande nationale gedrukte bibliografie Bibliotheca Danica.Het artikel besluit met een aantal mogelijke toekomstige onderwerpen voor

onderzoek. De auteur concludeert dat boekgeschiedenis in Denemarken een levendigediscipline is in het spanningsveld tussen geschiedenis, bibliografie enliteratuurwetenschap, waar de traditionele bibliografie plotseling de zwakste schakelis.

CésarManrique Figueroa,De studie van het boek in Spaanstalig Amerika.Over de consolidering van nationale identiteiten


De boekgeschiedenis in Latijns Amerika, tenminste voor zover ze bekeken wordtvanuit een Westers perspectief, begon onder het Spaanse koloniale bewind dat deEuropeanisatie, of liever de Hispanisatie van Latijns Amerika in gang zette. Deperifere positie van het gebied ten opzichte van Europa in de vroegmoderne tijd,samen met de verschillende onafhankelijkheidsprocessen van de negentiende eeuw,en de modernisering van de meeste Latijns-Amerikaanse staten in de laatste honderdjaar, bepaalden mede de onderzoekslijnen van de boekwetenschappers. Het huidigeartikel biedt een overzicht van de boekgeschiedenis van Latijns Amerika, vanMexicotot Argentinië maar zonder Brazilië, vanaf de koloniale periode tot


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vandaag. Daarbij komen de onderwerpen en trends aan bod die het boekhistorischonderzoek in deze immense culturele en geografische regio hebben bepaald. Tenslotte worden demodernisering en professionalisatie van de huidige onderzoekslijnenbesproken, en wordt een idee gegeven van de uitdagingen die de toekomst brengt.


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Biographies

Jos A.A.M. Biemans was Curator of Manuscripts of the Amsterdam UniversityLibrary (UvA) from 1991 untill 2011. In 2004, he was appointed extraordinaryProfessor of Palaeography and Codicology in the Faculty of Humanities, Universityof Amsterdam. Apart from teaching, he is currently engaged in the writing of a newhistory of the Amsterdam University Library from 1578 to 2015.

Archie L. Dick is Professor in the Department of Information Science at theUniversity of Pretoria. His main research interests are the history of reading, libraryhistory, intellectual history and intellectual freedom. His latest book is The hiddenhistory of South Africa's book and reading cultures, Toronto 2012.

Peter R. Frank specialises in book research, especially the history of the book inAustria in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (Habsburg Monarchy). He isco-founder of the Gesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich. His publicationsinclude Von der systematischen Bibliographie (1978); (as co-editor:) Buchwesen inWien 1750-1850. Kommentiertes Verzeichnis der Buchdrucker, Buchhändler undVerleger, Wiesbaden 2008; he is an editor of theMitteilungen der Gesellschaft fürBuchforschung in Österreich and the series Buchforschung. Beiträge zum Buchwesenin Österreich.

Johannes Frimmel is research assistant for the Buchwissenschaft course at theUniversity of Munich. His publications (as co-editor) include 18th century studiesin Austria, 1945-2010, Bochum 2011, and Kommunikation und Information im 18.Jahrhundert. Das Beispiel der Habsburgermonarchie, Wiesbaden 2009.

Murray G. Hall is Professor of German at the University of Vienna. He specialisesin publishing history in Austria in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, provenanceresearch, and Austrian literature in the inter-war years. He is co-founder of theGesellschaft für Buchforschung in Österreich and co-editor of Buchforschung.Beiträge zum Buchwesen in Österreich. His publications include Der Fall Bettauer.Wien 1978; Robert Musil. Briefe 1901-1942. Hrsg. von Adolf Frisé. Unter MitarbeitvonMurray G. Hall. Reinbek bei Hamburg 1981;Österreichische Verlagsgeschichte1918-1938. Band I: Geschichte des österreichischenVerlagswesens; Band II: Lexikonder belletristischen Verlage.Wien 1985;Der Paul Zsolnay Verlag. Von der Gründungbis zur Rückkehr aus dem Exil. Tübingen 1994; Handbuch der Nachlässe undSammlungen österreichischer Autoren. 2nd impr.Wien 1995; (as co-editor):GeraubteBücher. Die Österreichische Nationalbibliothek stellt sich ihrer NS-Vergangenheit.Wien 2004; (as co-author): ‘...allerlei für die Nationalbibliothek zu ergattern...’. Eineösterreichische Institution in der NS-Zeit. Böhlau: Wien-Köln-Weimar 2006.


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Prof. Dr. Christine Haug is Professor of Buchwissenschaft at the University ofMunich and director of theBuchwissenschaft programmes. Her main areas of researchinclude the history of the book and publishing trade from the eighteenth and twentiethcenturies, especially the clandestine book market in the eighteenth century and thedevelopment of sub-markets in the book trade (such as railway bookstores anddepartment stores) as well as author-publisher relationships around 1900 (amongothers Stefan George). She is co-editor, together with Prof. Dr. Vincent Kaufmann(MCM Universität. St. Gallen), of Kodex, the yearbook of the InternationaleBuchwissenschaftliche Gesellschaft, and co-editor, together with Thomas Fuchs andDetlev Döring (Leipzig), of the Leipziger Jahrbuch zur Buchgeschichte.

Peter Kornicki is Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Cambridge andDeputy Warden of Robinson College. He is the author of The book in Japan. Acultural history from the beginnings to the nineteenth century (Leiden 1998), co-editorof The female as subject: Women and the book in Japan (Ann Arbor 2010), andworks on vernacularisation and the book in East Asia.

Dr. César Manrique has recently received his doctoral degree in history from theUniversity of Leuven (KUL). His main research interests are in bibliographical andartistic exchanges between the Southern Netherlands and the Hispanic World in thesixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Since 2009 he has been amember of the VlaamseWerkgroep Boekgeschiedenis. Among his publications related to book history are‘Los impresores bruselenses y su producción dirigida al mercado hispano, siglosXVI-XVII’, in: Erebea. Revista de humanidades y ciencias sociales 2 (2012), 205-226;and ‘From Antwerp to Veracruz. Southern Netherlands books in Mexican coloniallibraries’, in: De gulden passer 87 (2009) 2, 93-112.

DavidMcKitterick FBA is Librarian and Vice-Master of Trinity College, Cambridge.His books include the standard history of Cambridge University Press from thesixteenth to the late twentieth centuries (3 vols, 1992-2004), and the history ofCambridge University Library in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (1986).More recent work includes Print, manuscript and the search for order (Cambridge2003), and Old books, new technologies; the representation, conservation andtransformation of books since 1700 (2013). He is one of the general editors of theCambridge history of the book in Britain.

Frederick Nesta is founder and Executive Director of the Centre for the History ofthe Book in China. Previously he was University Librarian at Lingnan University inHong Kong and has had a long career in academic, special, and corporate librariesin New York and London.

Aina Nøding is a postdoctoral research fellow in History at the University of Oslo,and a partner in the research project Diversifying Publics and Opinions, onDano-Norwegian journals in the eighteenth century. She holds a PhD in comparativeliterature, with a study on literature published in Norwegian eighteenth-centurynewspapers (2007). Her interest lies in the intersection of literature, book and mediahistory. Publications include contributions to T. Rem (ed.), Bokhistorie, 2003; H.Fr.


Dahl (ed.), Norsk presses historie, 2010 and V. Ystad (ed.), Henrik Ibsen's writings,2008-2010.

Dr Roger Osborne has published widely in the fields of book history, print cultureand textual criticism. He completed a PhD at the UNSW in 2000 and was a postdoctoralfellow in the Australian Studies Centre, University of Queensland, from 2004-2007.He was project manager of the Aus-e-Lit Project from 2008-2011, and, from 2012,is a member of the steering committee of the Australian Electronic Scholarly Editingproject. He is co-editor of the Cambridge edition of Joseph Conrad's Under WesternEyes (forthcoming 2013) and as the 2011 Nancy Keesing Fellow at the State Libraryof New South Wales, he is working towards an electronic edition of Joseph Furphy'sSuch is Life.


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DrBenito Rial Costas is an independent scholar based in Spain and Italy. He receivedhis PhD from the University of Santiago de Compostela in 2006. Since the publicationof his Producción y comercio del libro en Santiago de Compostela (2007), he hasbeen engaged in research and writing on printing and book trade in Castile in thefifteenth and sixteenth century. He is General Secretary of the Asociación Españolade Bibliografía and Liaison Officer of the Society for the History of Authorship,Reading and Publishing. His most recent publication is the edited volume PrintCulture and Peripheries in Early Modern Europe (2012).

Dr Slávka Rude-Porubská is an academic staff member in the Buchwissenschaftprogrammes at the University ofMunich. Hermain fields of research are the sociologyof literary translating and the contemporary book market and literary scene.

Prof.Wolfgang Schmitz is Professor of Library Science at the University of Cologne,has been director of the Universitäts- und Stadtbibliothek in Cologne since 1999 andsince 2001 also head of the university archive. His research fields include book andpublishing history in the Early Modern Age, especially book printing in Cologne, aswell as topics pertaining to the contemporary book and library scene. In addition, hehas been Chairman since 2004 of the Wolfenbütteler Arbeitskreis für Bibliotheks-,Buch- undMediengeschichte, Chairman of the Internationale BuchwissenschaftlicheGesellschaft, and corresponding member of the Historische Kommission desBörsenvereins in Frankfurt am Main and Leipzig.

Dr Anders Toftgaard is a research librarian at the Department of Manuscripts andRare Books at The Royal Library, Copenhagen. He is specialised in French andItalian Renaissance literature and in book history. His most recent publications includethe anthology (ed. with M.H. Andersen) Dialogo e conversazione. I luoghi di unasocietà ideale (Olschki 2012), and articles on Montaigne in Les Chapitres oubliésdes Essais de Montaigne (ed. P. Desan), Champion 2011 and Revue romane 45(2010) and on Giacomo Castelvetro in Fund og Forskning 50 (2011).

Stijn Van Rossem started his career as bibliographer for the Short-Title Catalogue,Flanders (STCV). He curated exhibitions on chapbooks and the history of the Dutchdictionary. His fields of interest lie primarily in revolutionary imagery and publishingstrategies during the ancien regime. He is currently preparing a PhD on the printingpress production and the publishing strategies of the Verdussen family. He alsoteaches history of graphic design at the School of Arts Ghent (KASK) and he is thecurrent president of the Flanders Book Historical Society (VWB).

Adriaan van der Weel is Bohn extraordinary professor of Modern Dutch BookHistory at the University of Leiden, lecturing in the department of Book Studies. Hisresearch interests in Book Studies concentrate on the digitisation of textualtransmission, publishing studies, scholarly communication, and (popular) readingand publishing. He is editor of a number of book series on these subjects, andEuropean articles editor of Digital humanities quarterly. His latest book is Changingour textual minds: Towards a digital order of knowledge (Manchester 2011).


RikardWingård is a PhD in literature at University of Gothenburg. His dissertation,Att sluta från början. Tidigmodern läsning och folkbokens receptionsestetik(Bokenäset 2011), on the reading and critique of Volksbücher in the seventeenthcentury, has been rewarded by the Swedish Academy and The Royal Society of Artsand Sciences in Gothenburg. Currently he is investigating the scribal publication ofSwedish novel translations around 1700, and preparing a project on the early modernconcept of text. In his spare time, he is also a practicing letterpress printer.


Jaarboek voor Nederlandse boekgeschiedenis. Jaargang 20

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