Against the Grain
Volume 29 | Issue 6 Article 22
December 2017 Wryly Noted-Books About Books John D. Riley Gabriel Books, [email protected]
Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/atg Part of the Library and Information Science Commons
Recommended Citation Riley, John D. (2017) "Wryly Noted-Books About Books," Against the Grain: Vol. 29: Iss. 6, Article 22. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7771/2380-176X.7886
This document has been made available through Purdue e-Pubs, a service of the Purdue University Libraries. Please contact [email protected] for additional information. Wryly Noted — Books About Books Column Editor: John D. Riley (Against the Grain Contributor and Owner, Gabriel Books)
Paper: Paging Through History by Mark Kurlansky. (ISBN: 978-0-393-23961-4, thanks to the development of an ingenious W. W. Norton, New York 2016.) device: a water-powered drop hammer.” An- other Fabriano invention was the wire mold for laying paper. “Fine wire mesh laid paper came his book is not only a history of paper, ample room to wander into Aztec paper making to define European paper. Another pivotal but equally, of written language, draw- or artisan one vat fine paper making in Japan. innovation in Fabriano was the watermark. Ting, and printing. It is about the cultural Another trademark of Kurlansky’s is a Now the paper maker could ‘sign’ his work.” and historical impact of paper and how it has pointed sense of humor. When some groups The smell from paper mills has always been central to our history for thousands of advocated switching to more electronic formats been pungent, due to the use of old, dirty rags years. Paper has changed how we commu- to save trees, he mentions that the drive to boy- and ammonia for softening the fibers. In early nicate and even how we think and create. It cott toilet paper failed because no electronic years, human urine was the source for that is so common now that we rarely consider its substitute has been found! But, on a more ammonia. Urine collectors traveled through history and development. This book makes serious note, he does comment on the drive to town collecting this valuable substance. that history come alive. make growing trees for paper production more Gutenberg acquired his printing press from “Some historians think that the idea of responsive to ecological concerns and that the a paper mill, where it had probably been used papermaking came from felting, a practice drive has yielded success with the decline in both for pressing felt and paper sheets. “Some that pre-dated weaving...” writes author, Mark clear cutting and more sustainable practices, historians say that the press was a copy of an Kurlansky, who then goes on to define paper including recycling. Paper companies have real- olive oil press or wine press, because Guten- as “cellulose fibers that are randomly mixed ized that such practices are a valuable sales tool. berg came from Mainz, the heart of Rheingau in water and are deposited in sheet form.” While the author is tracing the history of pa- wine country.” This definition separates true paper from other per and its migration from China to the Muslim “Venice had always been one of Europe’s writing surfaces such as bark, animal skins, or world and finally to Europe in the late Middle most important paper trading center and quick- leaves. So papyrus, despite having given its Ages he touches on such cogent details as: ly became the printing capital of Italy. By name to paper, is only briefly mentioned in the beginning of the sixteenth century, when this history. The Chinese are credited with the The direction of writing has varied widely throughout history “...from right to left, left to Naples had 67 printers, Rome 41, and Florence invention of paper and a man by the name of 37, Venice had 268.” Cai Lun is honored in China as its inventor, right, top to bottom, bottom to top, and from though the idea that one person discovered it the middle outward. Mayans and Aztecs wrote “Machine-made books and handmade is unlikely, as there was a long history of writ- all over the page, with lines directing the read- paper were a tough combination. Purchasing ing on materials such as silk and other woven er where to go next. The Chinese for a time enough paper to print Cervantes’ Don Quixote products. Cai Lun in 105 CE “...reported to wrote in alternate lines and went back to read took four years to acquire the 550,000 sheets the emperor that he made paper from the bark the skipped ones.” necessary, which when folded down to eight of trees, hemp, rags of cloth, and fishing nets.” In the Arab world the use of paper spread sheets yielded four million pages.” To illustrate This launched paper into common usage. quickly because “...it was less costly, more how things had changed with the industrial lightweight, and more durable than papyrus production of paper, Diderot’s Encyclopedie It somehow seems predestined that paper required 36 million sheets of fine thick paper. would be invented in China, given the social, and, in the interest of security, it couldn’t be religious and trade practices at that time. Liter- altered as easily as parchment.” Because the Puritans were so keen on acy was a basic skill for the Chinese, especially “The Arabs had many uses for different converting Native Americans, the first Bible in government, where “rulers required that types of paper. A special light, thin paper was printed in America was printed in 1663 in the their underlings record everything.” Besides made for messages carried by carrier pigeon Algonquin language. The second Bible was writing, paper was used for hats and clothes, and some paper was even made from cloth printed nearly a century later in English. kites and lanterns, fans and religious flags and wrappings of mummies.” This fact points up Rene Antoine Ferchault de Reamur, be- banners. When printing was developed, first the central place of rags in the manufacture of sides inventing the Celsius temperature scale, as a wood block technique, the Buddhist reli- paper. A whole industry grew up around pro- was fascinated with insects. He studied wasps gion was ideally suited to adapt the technique curing rags for making paper. Chiffonniere is and found that they built nests from wood for duplication of prayers and sutras to gain the word for rag pickers in French and is also fibers, nests which resembled paper. He pro- “merit.” In the tenth century, a Buddhist monk the word for a chest of drawers that holds small duced a study of the wasp nests which helped made 140,000 copies of a picture of a pagoda in pieces of clothing. lead to the manufacture of paper from wood pulp. In the search for materials to replace the China. There are records of Buddhist printings Much of the development of modern paper finite supply of rags, inventors tried everything of 20,000, 50,000, or 70,000 copies. “The more manufacturing occurred in Fabriano, Italy in from potatoes to okra! copies, the greater the blessing.” the Middle Ages. There had been felt mills The author, Mark Kurlansky, loves detail there for centuries and the transition to paper “When paper makers started using wood and he likes to veer off onto side trips such making was simply a matter of refitting the pulp to make paper they used acidic water to as the history of newspaper cartoon strips, water-powered machinery to pound rags and break down fibers. The only problem is that the linotype machines, the history of watermarks, lay paper rather than pound wool and make felt acid continued breaking down the paper even the1960s fad for paper clothing, or the 1890s cloth. Fabriano paper was extremely durable after manufacture. It wasn’t until after 1970 fad for men’s cardboard shirt collars. He likes “because paper makers worked closely with that acid free paper was embraced.” to show the full range of paper from postage the sheep industry and sized their product with As you can see, Mark Kurlansky covers stamps to diapers and from bottle labels to glue made from the gelatin produced by boiling all aspects of paper history and manufacture. tea bags. If you have read Cod or Salt, two sheepskin scraps.” In Fabriano they also made In fact his book resembles his subject: random of Kurlansky’s previous books, you already the transition from parchment to paper, finding strands of detail woven together to make a know that quirky historical digressions have paper to be so much cheaper to produce. “Pa- whole. If you want to read a detailed, while always been his trademark. But he has outdone per historians estimate that between 210 and not truly scholarly history of paper, this would himself in this work and though the book lacks 225 sheep had to be slaughtered to make one make a great introduction to a seemingly end- flow it does follow a chronological order with Bible. Cheap paper was invented in Fabriano, less study.
44 Against the Grain / December 2017 - January 2018