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Remaindering Jane

by
October 2008, no. 305

The Business of Books: Booksellers and the English book trade 1450–1850 by James Raven

Yale University Press (Inbooks), $130 hb, 448 pp

Remaindering Jane

by
October 2008, no. 305

Who was hanged, disembowelled and quartered after printing ‘nawghtye papystycall Bookes’? William Carter. Where did English booksellers store and sell their books? For several centuries, mostly from tiny shops near St Paul’s. How tiny is tiny? Zachary and William Stewart had ten feet from their shopfront to the back of the yard. Who was the builder and owner of the Temple of the Muses, the biggest bookshop of its time? James Lackington. How did eighteenth-century booksellers use newspapers to promote their wares? Through the ‘puff’, a sensationalist pushing of a single book, and the ‘cloud’, a lengthy listing of many books. Who remaindered Jane Austen’s Emma? John Murray II. The questions, big and small, are endless, and this book provides the answers.

Graham Tulloch reviews ‘The Business of Books: Booksellers and the English book trade 1450–1850’ by James Raven

The Business of Books: Booksellers and the English book trade 1450–1850

by James Raven

Yale University Press (Inbooks), $130 hb, 448 pp

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