Introduction to Contemporary Print Culture: Books as Media

257 Pages·2021·9.825 MB·English

by  Simone Murray

Introduction to Contemporary
Print Culture
Introduction to Contemporary Print Culture examines the role of the book in the
modern world. It considers the book’s deeply intertwined relationships with
other media through ownership structures, copyright and adaptation, the
constantly shifting roles of authors, publishers and readers in the digital
ecosystem and the merging of print and digital technologies in contemporary
understandings of the book object.
Divided into three parts, the book first introduces students to various
theories and methods for understanding print culture, demonstrating how
the study of the book has grown out of longstanding academic disciplines.
The second part surveys key sectors of the contemporary book world – from
independent and alternative publishers to editors, booksellers, readers and
libraries – focusing on topical debates. In the final part, digital technologies
take centre stage as eBook regimes and mass-digitisation projects are examined
for what they reveal about information power and access in the twenty-first
century.
This book provides a fascinating and informative introduction for students
of all levels in publishing studies, book history, literature and English,
media, communication and cultural studies, cultural sociology, librarianship
and archival studies and digital humanities.
Simone Murray is Associate Professor in Literary Studies at Monash
University, Melbourne, Australia, and an elected Fellow of the Australian
Academy of the Humanities. She is the author of three previous books, in-
cluding The Adaptation Industry: The Cultural Economy of Contemporary Literary
Adaptation (2012).

Introduction to
Contemporary Print
Culture
Books as Media
Simone Murray
First published 2021
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2021 Simone Murray
The right of Simone Murray to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by her in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in
any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-0-367-33901-2 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-33899-2 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-0-429-32274-7 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by MPS Limited, Dehradun
For the many students who took my unit ‘Print Cultures:
Books as Media’ over the course of a decade, and especially
for the one who suggested that, if an appropriate textbook
didn’t exist, I should write one.

Contents
List of figures ix
Introduction: what is ‘print culture’? 1
PART I
Theories and methodologies for understanding print 15
1 Medium theory 17
2 Book history 34
3 Political economy 52
4 Cultural policy 70
PART II
Socio-cultural dimensions of books 8 9
5 Independent and alternative publishing 91
6 Editing 108
7 Adaptation: books beyond their covers 126
8 Book retailing 143
9 Cultures of reading 162
10 Libraries and archives 181
viii Contents
PART III
Book futures 199
11 Digital books 201
12 The dream of a universal library: digitising knowledge 220
Index 238
Figures
I.1 ‘Platform 9¾’, King’s Cross Station, London 7
1.1 Gerard Dou, Old Woman Reading 23
1.2 Modern Book Printing, ‘Germany: Land of Ideas’ installation 25
1.3 The Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Olympics: Paper,
represented by the scroll 29
1.4 A later part of the Opening Ceremony showcased China’s
historical claim to have invented moveable-type printing 29
2.1 Leslie Howsam’s triangular diagram of book history 39
2.2 Digital Publishing ‘Communications Circuit’ 42
2.3 Title from Oldcastle Books’ Pulp! the Classics series 45
3.1 Karl Marx’s ‘base and superstructure’ model 54
3.2 Mark McGurl’s ‘Institutional Environments of Contemporary
US Fiction’ diagram 57
3.3 Word factory cartoon 60
4.1 The world’s ‘Top 10 most literate countries’ 74
4.2 ‘Australia’s top 100 books’ 79
4.3 UNESCO’s World Book and Copyright Day 81
5.1 Haymarket Books 95
5.2 Melbourne’s Sticky Institute Zine Fair 102
6.1 Raymond Carver’s Beginners 110
6.2 Colin Firth and Jude Law in Genius 113
7.1 Spoof covers of H.G. Wells’s classic science fiction 127
7.2 Sydney Writers’ Festival poster 129
7.3 ‘Said I Read You but I Lied’ Audible ad 135
8.1 Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks in You’ve Got Mail 147
8.2 The online world meets bricks-and-mortar retailing at the
Amazon Books store 153
8.3 Bookstore browsers are encouraged to scan a title’s
shelf-talker barcode 154
8.4 It is then a mere step for shoppers to use their smartphone
similarly in other retail outlets 155