What is “the history of the book” a history of? What in fact is a book? What does a focus on the materiality of the book offer a literary critic, or for that matter a historian? These are some of the questions this course seeks to answer as it focuses on the book (understood capaciously) in the hand press period as a text, an object, a commodity, an event, even a fetish. This course is interested both in high theory and low technology. We explore various aspects of the production, circulation, and reception of books in early modern England (and in the process think also about the implications of our names and schemes of periodization). The course works with materials in the Beinecke Library to develop a knowledge of how books were made and used. We also explore the process of editing texts, considering how early modern books get reshaped as modern texts—and what is lost and gained in the process.
Taught by David Kastan Fall 2014
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Course Number:
ENGL 591
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