Primavera 2018

MW(F) 11, Sever 213

Léo Lacerda
Dept of History
Office: CGIS South Building S437 (one of the pair of new orange buildings, at 1730 Cambridge St)
Office hours: M 2-4
Phone: 5-0752
E-mail: amblair@fas

TF: Amy Houston

Office hours: Fri 2-4pm
Office: Robinson Hall L-18
Email: ahouston@fas

History 1318
História do livro e da leitura

This course is an introduction to the new and growing field in cultural history known as the history of
the book. We will consider major developments from scroll to web, but focus more in depth on early
modern Europe, 15th-18th centuries. Major themes include the economic and technical conditions
governing book production and trade; the political and religious forces behind censorship and
regulation; and the social and intellectual contexts and forms of reading, in learned as well as more
popular circles. Assignments will include recent secondary sources and selected primary texts used as
case studies. No prerequisites; all readings in English.

Requirements:
-regular attendance and participation in section (10%); in general the Friday meeting will be devoted
to a discussion in section focused mostly on the primary source reading
-short paper (3-5pp) due in Week IV (topics to be assigned, 15%)
-midterm (20%) and final exam (25%)
-10-12pp paper, due at the end of reading period, Friday May 12 at noon (30%)

Disponível em COOP (preços são da Amazon.com):

História da Leitura no Mundo Ocidental, ed. Guglielmo Cavallo e Roger Chartier (Ática, 1999) 1-
55849-213-5; $40
Book History Reader, ed. David Finkelstein and Alistair McCleery (Routledge, 2001) 0-415-22658-
9; $28.95
Peter Burke,
Roger Chartier, A ordem dos livros: leitores, autores e bibliotecas na Europa entre os séculos XIV e
XVIII (UnB, 1998)
Roger Chartier, Leitura e leitores na França do Antigo Regime (UNESP, 2003)
Lucien Febvre, O aparecimento do livro (UNESP, 1992)
Robert Darnton, Os best-sellers proibidos (Companhia das Letras, 1998)
Plato, Phaedrus (Hackett);
Phyllis Goodhart Gordan, Two Renaissance Book Hunters (Columbia Univ Press, 1974); $28;
George Gissing, New Grub Street (Everyman Paperback Classics, 2002) 0460077240; $9.95
David M. Levy, Scrolling Forward: Making Sense of Documents in the Digital Age (Arcade
Publishing, 2001) 1559705531; $18
Montaigne, Essays, tr. Michael Screech (Penguin, 1993) 0140446044; $23.95
Benjamin Franklin, Autobiografia (Norton critical edition, 1986) ; $14.95
Syllabus

Week I (WED Feb 1): o que é história do livro?

W lecture 1: as origens e o desenvolvimento do campo
F: no class
Leitura: Darnton, "What is the History of Books?" and D.F. McKenzie, "The Book as an
Expressive Form," in Book History Reader
History of Reading, introduction

Parte I: antes de Gutenberg

Week II (Feb 6): oralidade e o livro na Antiguidade

M lecture 2: orality and literacy in Antiquity
W lecture 3: the papyrus roll and the origins of the codex in early Christian culture
F: discussion section
Leitura: History of Reading, chs. 1-2
Ong, "Orality and Literacy," in Book History Reader
Plato, Phaedrus, beginning to 230, 234b-237a, 242-243, 257-end (esp. 274-end)
[these are not page numbers but section numbers stnadard in all editions of Plato]

Week III (Feb 13): o mundo do manuscrito medieval

M lecture 4: a evolução do livro na Idade Média
W lecture 5: cultura manuscrita medieval
F: discussion section
Reading: History of Reading, chs. 3-5.
Richard de Bury, Philobiblon, available on-line from course website and as part of the
Gutenberg project:
ftp://sailor.gutenberg.org/pub/gutenberg/etext96/phlbb10.txt

Of related interest (not part of the course): Humanities Center Seminar, Mon Feb 13, 6pm: Frank
Kafker (Emeritus, University of Cincinnati) and Jeffrey Loveland (University of Cincinnati), "The
Elusive Laurent Durand, Leading Publisher of the French Enlightenment" Barker Ctr Room 133.

Week IV (Feb 20): as origens da impressão na China

M: HOLIDAY
W lecture 6: printing in China; SHORT PAPER DUE in class (on your choice of course-
related theme in Plato or Richard de Bury)
F: discussion section
Reading: Joseph Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 5, pt I Printing and Paper by
Tsien Tsuen-Hsuin, pp. 1-17, 360-83
Achilles Fang, "Bookman's Decalogue," Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 13
(1950), pp. 132-73 (on-line through HOLLIS)
 Part II: Early modern Europe

Week V (Feb 27): humanism and printing

M lecture 7: Gutenberg
W lecture 8: spread and development of printing in the first 100 years
F: discussion section
FRIDAY 3/3: special session at Houghton Library (a 1-1/2 hour slot between 1:00 and
4:30)**this session is required as an integral (and especially fun!) part of the course**
Reading: Adrian Johns, "The Book of Nature and the Nature of the Book," Jan-Dirk Müller,
"The Body of the Book," and Elizabeth Eisenstein, "Defining the Initial Shift," in Book History
Reader
Anthony Grafton, "The Importance of Being Printed" (Review of Eisenstein's 1980
The Printing Press as an Agent of Change) in Journal of Interdisciplinary History 11 (1980) pp 265-
286 (on-line through HOLLIS)

Week VI (March 6): censorship

M lecture 9: censorship
W discussion and review for midterm
F: MIDTERM
Reading: History of Reading chs. 8-9
H-J Martin, The History and Power of Writing, on censorship, pp. 266-82.

Week VII (March 13): authorship

M lecture 10: legal and economic status of the author
W lecture 11: Montaigne
F: discussion
Reading: Barthes, "The Death of the Author," Foucault, "What is an Author?" and Rose,
"Literary Property Determined," in Book History Reader
Montaigne, Essays I, 25 (of pedantry); II, 10 (of books); II, 33 (story of Spurina); III,
3 (three kinds of association); III, 13 (only until mention of China, 4-5 pp into the essay)
George Hoffmann, "The Montaigne Monopoly: Revising the Essais under the French
privilege System," PMLA (1993): 308-19 (available on-line through HOLLIS)

Of related interest (not part of the course): Humanities Center Seminar/Houghton Library
Winship lecture, Tuesday March 14, 5:30pm, Ian Maclean (All Souls College, Oxford), "Murder,
Debt and Retribution: the Italico-Franco-Spanish book trade and the Beraud-Michel-Ruiz Affair,"
Houghton Library Exhibition Room.

Week VIII (March 20): reading

M lecture 12: "popular" reading
W lecture 13: learned reading
F: discussion section
Reading: History of Reading, chs. 7 and 10
Chartier, "Labourers and Voyagers" and "The Practical Impact of Writing," in Book
History Reader
William Sherman, "What Renaissance Readers Wrote in their Books" in Jennifer
Andersen and Elizabeth Sauer eds., Books and Readers in Early Modern England, pp. 119-37.
Week of March 27: SPRING BREAK

Week IX (April 3): book collecting

M lecture 14: librairies STATEMENT OF FINAL PAPER TOPICS DUE IN CLASS
W lecture 15: the continued uses of manuscript
F: discussion section
Reading: Harold Love, "Early modern print culture: assessing the models." Parergon. Journal
of the Australian and New Zealand Association for Medieval and Early Modern Studies 20 (2003):
45-64.
Gabriel Naudé, Instructions concerning erecting of a library, tr. John Evelyn (pdf file
available from course website)

Week X (April 10): books and the public sphere in the Enlightenment
M lecture 16: the book in the American colonies
W lecture 17: do books make revolutions?
F: discussion
Reading: History of Reading, ch. 11.
Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography, parts I and II.

Of related interest (not part of the course) Humanities Center Seminar/Warren Center talk, Tues
April 11, 4-6pm, Alexandra Walsham (University of Exeter), "Recording Superstition in Early
Modern Britain: The Origins of Folklore Revisited," Robinson Hall Basement Seminar Room.

Part III: modernity and beyond

Week XI (April 17): the modern world of print

M lecture 18: the industrialization of book production
W lecture 19: the book as a commodity in 19th ct England
F: discussion section
Reading: History of Reading, ch. 12.
George Gissing, New Grub Street (first published 1891), "the first volume"

Week XII (Apr 24): perspectives on rea

M lecture 20: from periodical to newspaper
W lecture 21: coping with information overload
F: discussion section
Reading: Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities, pp. 26-46.
Kate Flint, "Reading Practices" in Book History Reader
William St Clair, "The Political Economy of Reading" John Coffin Memorial Lecture
(2005) (on-line from the course website)
Peter McDonald, "Implicit Structures and Explicit Interactions: Pierre Bourdieu and
the History of the Book," The Library 6 19.2 (June 1997), 105-21
Paul Duguid, "Material Matters," in The Future of the Book, ed. Geoffrey Nunberg
(1996)

Week XIII (May 1): a post-modern world?

M lecture 22: the book in the electronic age
W lecture 23: conclusions
 F: discussion section
Reading: David Levy, Scrolling Forward.

FINAL PAPER DUE FRIDAY MAY 12--this is a FIRM deadline!

FINAL EXAM: Sat May 20 (note that date is subject to change by the registrar)