Erik Kwakkel, iSchool, UBC
Tuesday, November 13, 5-6:30 pm, with reception to follow

in the series
Green College Special Lecture

When Johannes Gutenberg introduced the printed book in Europe, in the middle of the fifteenth century, he did so in a world where books were already produced and sold for profit. In fact, this commercial enterprise existed over two centuries before the first book rolled off Gutenberg’s press. This lecture gauges what the medieval world of the commercial book production looked like. It draws attention to some striking parallels between manuscript and print culture, including the availability of cheaper books, the presence of highly specialized labor and competition, and the use of advertisements and spam. This paper ultimately argues that the medieval book trade was not so dissimilar from that of the “emerging” book trade in Gutenberg’s time. With that conclusion the lecture questions the validity of a common assumption: that the coming of print presents a clear break in the long development of the book.