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A Guide to Early Printed Books and Manuscripts

"This is an absolutely essential book. We have excellent handbooks for English printed books and manuscripts, but no one book that takes us through every aspect of the making and circulation of texts, from paper to binding to reading. Mark Bland meets an urgent need."
—Peter Stallybrass, University of Pennsylvania

Mark Bland (Author)

9781405124126, Wiley

Hardback, published 22 January 2010

256 pages
23.9 x 16.3 x 1.7 cm, 0.553 kg

“But this book contains useful material for any librarian seeking good arguments when advocating for the usefulness of their collection.”  (Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals, 2012)

“Showing an extensive knowledge of the scholarship in his field he provides an objective assessment, often correcting false reasoning and offering a sound explanation of the facts. For all these reasons, I believe that Mark Bland’s Guide would be of help to anyone interested in the discipline.”  (European Review of History: Revue europeenne d'histoire, 18 July 2012)

"Bland's book takes its place in a grand tradition of scholarly guides to analytical and descriptive bibliography ... Bland offers a clear and comprehensive guide to bibliography, and it is appropriate that it is most likely to come into its own as part of the work of making meaning, wedged open beneath a researcher's elbow." (The Review of English Studies, 23 December 2011)

"This book is indeed a very practical, clear and valuable guide to books and manuscripts of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries . . . The book is well illustrated and Bland makes good use of the images, especially in his exemplary discussion in Chapter Two about how to use watermark evidence." (Script and Print, 1 August 2011)

"This book will equip students, perhaps encountering sixteenth- and seventeenth-century texts for the first time, in their early printed or manuscript form (as distinct from modern editions), to approach bibliographical description and analysis without fear or confusion and, for those wishing to pursue the subject more widely, it will serve admirably as an introduction." (Routledge ABES, 2011)

A Guide to Early Printed Books and Manuscripts provides an introduction to the language and concepts employed in bibliographical studies and textual scholarship as they pertain to early modern manuscripts and printed texts 

  • Winner, Honourable Mention for Literature, Language and Linguistics, American Publishers Prose Awards, 2010
  • Based almost exclusively on new primary research
  • Explains the complex process of viewing documents as artefacts, showing readers how to describe documents properly and how to read their physical properties
  • Demonstrates how to use the information gleaned as a tool for studying the transmission of literary documents
  • Makes clear why such matters are important and the purposes to which such information is put
  • Features illustrations that are carefully chosen for their unfamiliarity in order to keep the discussion fresh

Illustrative Materials viii

Acknowledgments ix

1 A Guide for the Perplexed 1

2 Paper and Related Materials 22

3 The Structure of Documents 49

4 Producing Texts 83

5 Analysis and Evidence 122

6 Making Variants 149

7 Setting Conditions 183

8 Last Words 211

Selected Further Reading 219

Index 230

Subject Areas: Language: reference & general [CB]
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