Printingprinting History history news 31 News 1 The Newsletter of the National Printing Heritage Trust, Printing Historical Society and Friends of St Bride Library Number 31 Summer 2011 PHS Journal Editor and ST BRIDE EVENTS OTHER EVENTS Web-Editor Book History Research John Trevitt will retire as Editor of the Printing Historical Society Journal at Network the next AGM. Catherine Armstrong, who has been reviews editor of the The Book History Research Network Journal since 2007, will also retire will hold twice yearly events. There is shortly. John has edited the journal for information about these and a register four years, and Catherine the reviews of interests on their new website at: for five, and the Society is very grateful Print workshops www.bookhistory.org.uk. Please visit for their excellent work during this the website to register and to sign up St Bride Foundation is bringing letter- for the next free event. period. The PHS is delighted to wel- press printing back to Fleet Street. The come Dr Victoria Gardner as the new exhibition room has been transformed reviews editor to replace Catherine. into a printing workshop, where prac- PRINT NETWORKS However, we are still seeking an Editor tical teaching and hands-on experience for the Journal, and would be most can take place. A series of courses and CONFERENCES grateful for any suggestions or, better workshops is now on offer. Through- still, volunteers. If you would like to out 2011 the range of classes will be Religion and the book trade discuss the role with the current Editor, developed and expanded to include do please contact John Trevitt on kindred trades and techniques, in This, the twenty-ninth Print Networks [email protected]. response to the ideas which this new Conference on the history of the Brit- The Society is also seeking a Web- venture will inspire. ish book trade will take place at the Editor to prepare text and images for Bookings are currently being taken National Library of Wales at Aberyst- its website. Enthusiasm for the subject for a ‘letterpress short course’ (three wyth on 19–21 July 2011. Speakers and ideas about the content are more hours a week for six weeks), two-day will include Professor Cathy Shrank, important than a detailed knowledge ‘letterpress intensives’, one-day work- University of Sheffield, and Dr Eryn of web technology (the Web-Editor will shops for linocut and type posters and White, Aberystwyth University. prepare ‘content’, which will be mount- make-your-own-greeting-card classes. En-suite accommodation will be ed on the site by the Secretary). If you Group bookings are available. Open provided on the attractive campus of can help with either role, please contact access bookings for use of the space Aberystwyth University, overlooking the PHS Chairman, John Hinks, on can be made for four-hour and eight- Cardigan Bay. In addition to a full [email protected]. hour sessions, following an induction programme of papers, there will be to ensure best use of the facilities. For a conference dinner and a visit to the further information see the website at Roderic Bowen Library in Lampeter. Salford Museum printworkshop.stbridefoundation.org 2011 marks the four-hundredth anni- or contact the Foundation on 020 versary of the ‘Authorized Version’ of In our last issue (PHN 30, ‘Letter to 7353 3331. the Bible, and so Religion and the the editor’) it was reported that the The Foundation is also teaming up book trade has been chosen as the Salford Museum and Art Gallery at with the London Rare Books School to theme for the conference. A booking Peel Park ‘has not only closed but has offer a practice-based five-day course form and provisional programme are been demolished’. Happily, this is not to take place both in Bloomsbury and now available on Birmingham Uni- the case. The Museum is still very much at St Bride. Students will be taught how versity’s British Book Trade Index in existence and open to the public, to compose type, proof and print, and website at www.bbti.bham.ac.uk. and the early Stanhope press in their will then be given an opportunity to collections is safe. I would like to apolo- work on a small-scale project of their Cheap print and the book trade gise to the Museum, and to readers of own. The course will run from 4–8 July PHN, for this somewhat misleading 2011. It is limited to a maximum of 12 Next-year’s Print Networks Conference statement. I am delighted that Caroline students, so early booking is advised. will be on Cheap print and the book May of the Museum has written a short Further information and a booking trade. It will be held at the University of account of their printing-related hold- form can be found at the Institute of Leicester on 10–12 July 2012 and is ings, which appears on page 3 of this English Studies website at ies.sas.ac.uk/ being organized jointly with the Uni- newsletter. cmps/events/courses/LRBS/. versity of Leicester Chapbooks Project. 2 printing history news 31 Speakers will include Adam Fox of the Commissioned by King James I of University of Edinburgh and Sheila England and VI of Scotland, the trans- Graphic Design O’Connell of the British Museum. For lation was the outcome of the labours Letter to the Editor further information contact John of forty-seven scholars located in Ox- Hinks at [email protected]. The call for ford, Cambridge and Westminster. The The following e-mail was received from papers will be issued in November exhibition showcases the contribution Bruce Kennett of North Conway, New 2011 on the British Book Trade Index of the Oxford translation committees, Hampshire, in answer to my query website (see above). and has been organised by the Bod- about the earliest uses of the term leian in association with the Folger ‘graphic design’. Paul Shaw has also Book encounters, 1500–1750 Shakespeare Library, Washington, DC, drawn my attention to Dwiggins’ use where some items from the exhibition of this term. A conference with this title will be held will be on display in Autumn 2011. Admission is free. For further details, on Friday 1 July 2011 at Corsham You cited Walter George Raffe’s use of including library opening hours, see Court Centre, Bath Spa University, as the term ‘graphic design’ in the title of the website at www.bodleian.ox.ac.uk. the inaugural conference of the Univer- his 1927 book. At present I am com- sity’s newly formed Book, Text and pleting a biography of W. A. Dwiggins Place (1500–1750) Research Centre. and am pleased to offer you something In keeping with the Centre’s focus on ‘Out of the original sacred tongues’: the Bible and translation on this score. On 29 August 1922, the early modern literary culture and the Boston Evening transcript published history of the book broadly defined, an article by Dwiggins in which he used An exhibition in the Great Hall of Lam- this conference explores a wide variety the term ‘graphic design’. The article’s beth Palace, running 25 May–29 July of ‘encounters’ with the book, from title was ‘New kind of printing calls for 2011. This exhibition traces the pro- different cultural and geographical sites new design: old standards of excellence cesses of transformation involved in of production, circulation and reception suddenly superseded because of the com- translating the texts of the Bible from to various disciplines and periods with- plex of new processes in the industry – the sacred into vernacular tongues. On in early modernity. Conference fees are still the opportunity, however, for blend- display will be a wide range of import- £30.00 (£20.00 for students: a confer- ing common-sense with artistic taste’. ant manuscripts and books offering a ence subvention covering fees for stu- In the article, Dwiggins divided printing glimpse into the practical processes dents has been generously provided by into three categories: plain, fine art and involved, as well as the motives behind the Bibliographical Society). For details a third ‘large intermediate class of print- these great achievements. In addition to of the programme please see the website ing more or less modified by artistic the 1611 Bible itself, the exhibition at www.bathspa.ac.uk or contact Dr taste’. He identified plain printing as includes contemporary letters relating Christopher Ivic, Senior Lecturer in town reports, hand-bills, telephone to the translation, and other editions, English at Bath Spa University, on directories and the like; fine art was the including the first edition of Erasmus’s [email protected]. sort of thing produced by Bruce Rogers New Testament in Greek (1516), and for the Grolier Club; the third variety vernacular translations in a variety of was the broad spectrum of materials languages, including some of those that had come into prominence with KING JAMES BIBLE intended for missions (the Gospels in the rise of advertising, including a lot Maori and Mohawk, for example). EXHIBITIONS of direct-mail printing. Opening times: 11:00–16:00 Wednes- After describing the first two cate- 2011 is the quatercentenary of the first day to Saturday. Admission by pre- gories, Dwiggins explored the third form publication of the Authorized Version booking only; tickets cost £6.00 for of printing and its reliance on advert- (‘King James’) Bible, and there is a adults (children under seventeen free). ising art departments for the production plethora of events and exhibitions For further details see the website at of illustrations and decorations to under way to mark this anniversary.