Adams and Barker 1993

Adams, Thomas R. and Nicolas Barker. "A New Model for the Study of the Book." A Potencie of Life: Books in Society. Ed. Nicolas Barker. London: British Library, 1993. 5-43.

Martin, Febvre, The coming of the book -- began tradition of "the history of the book"

Eisenstein presented a critique of history with Printing Press -- social revolutions caused by printing press, rather than other way around; Darnton, too, focusing on Enlightenment

the bibliographer is thus "unexpectedly dragged into the limelight by academic historians" (6)

bibliography used to occupy same position as archaeology; but now seems doomed always to be a handmiden to other disciplines

quintessentially interdisciplinary

"The power of books is not just what strikes the eye, but what may be latent, to be disclosed in the future." (9)

• "latent power is vastly magnified by the multiplicity of copies" (9)

bibliographers often too content "to dig their own small patch"; social historians can add much (10)

criticisms of Darnton's communication circuit:

• term "publisher" is anachronistic
• shipper (simply providing a service as he would for any other commodity) not as important as more general lines of communication
• most importantly, deals with people rather than books (12); focuses on history of communication
• "it ignores the sheer randomness, the speculative uncertainty of the book trade." (12)

term "book" doesn't include broadsides, ephemera, etc.; Adams and Baker propose "bibliographical document" (13) -- limit is if "the agent's intention involves the process of duplication" (13)

new model:

• still a circle of connected elements influenced by elements in the center
• but elements inverted
• indirect forces outside, exerting pressure
• five events in the life of a book: publishing, manufacturing, distribution, reception, survival

publishing:

• four parties: author, patron/financier, manufacturer, distributor
• four headings: creation, communication, profit, preservation
• "The decision to publish, not the creation of a text, is, then, the first step in the creation of a book." (18); often influenced heavily by factors not intrinsic to the text

manufacturing:

• how to include the printing press in a more general history of technology? (18-9)
• manufacture of illustrations, graphics? (19)
• manufacture of paper, ink? (19)
• physical look and feel of the book carries evidence of provenance; "deserves more attention as an aspect of the impact of printing" (20)
• binding: structure and appearance (20); progressive decline in durability of both
• "Throughout the whole manufacturing process the historian must take into account the essential ingredient that made it all happen, labour, particularly the place and function of labour in a new technology." (21)

distribution:

• begins the book's "dynamic phase" (22)
• four elements: initial impetus, consequent moving of books, destination (intentional, unintentional), momentum
• immediately after publishing, but also secondhand markets and how books survived to today
• various reasons to desire to own a book

reception:

• initially "passive" and "mute" (27)
• evidence: direct documentation (published and private responses), popularity (reprintings, sales), influence, use (27)
• book authors and manufacturers can't control its use (29)
• literacy rates; what is reading? (30)

survival:

• three stages:
  • creation and initial reception (determined by physical form, size, subsequent popularity);
  • comes to rest without any use (in danger of disappearing);
  • book becomes desirable as an object (for text or in its own right)

"What we offer is a map." (39)