SYMPOSIUM: WHAT WAS THE HISTORY OF THE BOOK? INTRODUCTION

Abstract

“‘Histoire du livre’”, remarked Robert Darnton in a much celebrated essay from 1982, “‘Geschichte des Buchwesens’…‘history of books’ or ‘of the book’ in English-speaking countries—its name varies from place to place, but everywhere it is being recognized as an important new discipline”. In the twenty-five years since Darnton's original observation book history has if anything continued to flourish. With a number of multi-volume national histories of the book now at various stages of completion, an international infrastructure of research centres, teaching programmes and publishers’ lists, quite clearly something has been happening.