Worldwide Activity on Book and Trade History
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LOGOS Remembrance of things past: Worldwide activity on book and trade history Ian Willison Publisheis and booksellets aie membeis of a ttade with a fascinating histoiy which has much social, economic and cultuial significance. Yet (with one OI two exceptions) they have nevei displayed much inteiest in the history of their trade or of the book itself. The current worldwide research and writing on the history of the book and the book trade is inspired, not by ptactitioneis, but by academic insti One of the three general editors of the pro tutions and scholars in many countries who have jected seven-volume History of the Book in recognized that the history of the book has a special Britain, Ian Willison is also Chairman of contribution to make to the advance of the human the British Book Trade History Group. ities, offeiing an important opportunity foi inteidis- Until 1987 he was with the British ciplinaiy approaches. Robert Damton of Piinceton Museum Library, latterly in charge of its Univeisity calls the histoiy of the book "one of the English language Collections. WUlison is a most feitile developments in the human sciences". Senior Research Fellow of the Centre for In those countiies which have histoiically English Studies in the University of been leaders in the developing histoiy of the book, London and co-chairman of its Seminar on piogiess has been due in no small measure to the the Sociology of Texts. awaieness, on the part of theii trade associations, of theii lole in the national cultural mission. As long Tim Rix ago as 1876, Geimany's Boisenveiein in Leipzig set up a Histoiische Kommission, on the initiative of the publishei Eduatd Biockhaus. It produced the first publishing history journal, the Archiv fUr Geschichte des Deutschen Buchhandels, and then the first histoiy of a national book trade, Kapp and Goldfriedrich's four-volume Geschichte des Deutschen Buchharuiels to 1889, based on the canons of mod Chairman and Chief Executive of the ern historical scholarship. Longman Group until 1990, Tim Rix is Today, the Boisenveiein's Histoiische nowadays engaged in numerous book- Kommission - now in Frankfurt - is commissioning directed causes, including the Boards of a continuation of Kapp and Goldfiiediich to the the British Council and the British present day. At the moment, it pioceeds slowly, due Library. A past President of the Publishers to the pioblems of Geiman reunification. Association, Rix began his career with The curtent agenda foi the histoiy of the Longman in 1958, after graduating from book woildwide has been laigely set by the Fiench Cambridge and Yale Universities. Rix and publishing house Pio Modis and its ownei Jean- Willison are both Directors of the US's Pieiie Vivet, who appioached two leading lepiesen- Society for the History of Authorship, tatives of the Annales school of histoiians, Reading and Publishing. Henii-Jean Martin and Rogei Chaitiei, to pioduce. 99 LOGOS 4/2 © WHURR PUBUSHERS 1993 Willison/Rix between 1982 and 1986, the foui-volume Histoire de Cultural Re-awakening, commissioned from B S I'Edition Frangaise. The Cercle de la Librairie subse Kesavan, the former Librarian of the National quently acquired Pro Modis and actively supports Library, Calcutta. the Institut Memoiies de I'Edition Contempoiaine, Until recently, Bfitain, along with the set up in 1989 to help systematize the deposit of test of the English-speaking woild, did not fostei book ttade aichives, piomote and publish aichival the histoiy of the book systematically, although in leseaich and piovide an office foi the new Euio a lathei diffused way there has been a substantial pean book tiade histoiy Reseau International sur anglophone contiibution to the development of LHistoire du Livre et de L'Edition and its newsletter the general rationale of the study. Britain's Stanley In-Octavo. Morison and Graham Pollard began their informal In the former Soviet Union, three vol collaboration in the '30s with their interest in the umes entitled History of the Book in the USSR history of newspapers. It culminated in the late 1917-1921 were published between 1983 and 1986 '50s with their Lyell and Sandars lectures, respec as part of an ambitious pio ject oiganized by the tively Politics and Script (Morison) and The English Lenin Libiaiy, the All-Union Book Chambei, the Market for Printed Books (Pollard). Learned Council fot the Histoiy of World Culture More schematic and, in the shorter term, of the Academy of Sciences and the All-Union more provocative have been the ciitiques of the Society of Booklovers. These volumes were to be cultural piedominance embodied in piint, made by followed by five oi six seiies of monogiaphs covet scholais in Britain's former, culturally-dependent ing the whole Soviet peiiod. The pioject came to colonies. American literary histoiian William Chai- naught, fiistly as a lesult of ideological changes in vat's essay in 1949 on the American struggle for lit the glasnost peiiod (which would have necessitated erary and publishing independence. Literary wholesale lewiiting) and ultimately because of the Economics and Literary History, was followed by collapse of the Soviet Union. The most pioductive global critiques by Canadians Harold A Innis and centie fot the histoiy of the book in Russia has Marshall McLuhan, Empire and Communications been the Libiaiy of the Academy of Sciences (1950), The Bias of Communication (1951) and The (BAN) in St Petersburg, where a special histoiy of Gutenberg Galaxy (1962). The last in turn "stimu the book section was founded in 1974 by S P Lup- lated" Ameiican Elizabeth Eisenstein's compen pov. Since that time, it has organized conferences dious suivey. The Printing Press as an Agent of and published some seventeen monographs on the Change: Communications and Cultural Transforma history of the book in pre-revolutionary Russia. tions in Early-Modern Europe (1979). The whole This venture is now probably threatened by lack of line and complex of aigument were then distilled funds. A more lecent undertaking, likely to be by the New Zealandei D F McKenzie, now Piofes- equally pioductive, is the pioject on the histoiy of sof of Bibliography and Textual Ciiticism at the book in Siberia. Based at the State Public Sci Oxfoid, in his Biitish Libiaiy Panizzi Lectures of entific-Technical Libiaiy in Novosibiisk, it has 1985, Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts (1986 ). resulted in the publication of a numbei of mono McKenzie had flexed his muscles in his presidential giaphs and collections of articles thioughout the address to the Bibliogiaphical Society in 1983 on 1980s and 1990s. The Sociology of a Text: Orality, Literacy and Print in In Italy, the legionalism of the book tiade Early New Zealand. and the lack of a national pioject so fat have meant McKenzie diaws attention to the uniquely that Fiench leadership has been followed most con strong infiastiuctuie foi any pioject on the histoiy spicuously in the second volume - Produzjone e con- of the book in Biitain, piovided by the Biitish tia- sumo - of the masteily Letteratura italiana resulting dition of letiospective enumeiative bibliography. fiom the individual enteipiise of the anr\alisti schol- This tiadition is represented by the "short-title cat aily house of Einaudi in Tuiin. alogues" of the output of the Biitish press from Cax- Outside Euiope, in 1984, the National ton to 1914, the peiiod from then to the present Book Tiust of India published the fiist volume of a day being filled by the appropriate sector of the History of Printing and Publishing in India: A Story of Bfitish Libiaiy's General Catalogue, based on the 100 LOGOS 4/2 © WHUBR PUBUSHERS 1993 .