The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 14.0516 Monday, 17 March 2003
From: Al Magary <This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.>
Date: Saturday, 15 Mar 2003 20:29:21 -0800
Subject: 14.0461 Standard Work On Early English Book Publishing
Comment: Re: SHK 14.0461 Standard Work On Early English Book Publishing
>The Cambridge History of the Book Vol. 3 (1998) covers
>1400-1557 while Vol. 4 (2002) covers 1557-1695. I highly recommend
>both volumes.
I thank David Gants for this recommendation, and Nicholas Ranson for his
(H.S. Bennett, English Books and Readers..., 2 vols).
I was shocked when I looked up the price of the 800-page Cambridge
volumes: $140 each. Further shocks were to come as I searched the
catalogs of the San Francisco Public Library and the three universities
here: no copies. I searched the Melvyl catalog of the University of
California: six of the campuses have copies of Vol. 3 only. I checked
Stanford: two copies of Vol. 3 only.
Vols. 3 and 4 were published in the last four or five years, so there
are practically no secondhand copies available.
I am guessing that there are perhaps 40 copies of Vol. 3 in the entire
U.S. and 100 in the rest of the world. Vol. 4 may be in the hands of
the Library of Congress and a few others in the universe.
Are we returning to the days of illuminated books, produced one at a
time and kept chained? What is wrong with academic publishing?
Al Magary
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