The Library: A Fragile History

Product Information

I am the lead editor of two monograph series: the St Andrews Studies in Reformation History, and The Library of the Written Word. In 2012-2015 I served a three year term as Vice-President of the Royal Historical Society. The author's youthfulness helps to assure the inevitable comparison with the Anne Frank diary although over and above the sphere of suffering shared, and in this case extended to the death march itself, there is no spiritual or emotional legacy here to offset any reader reluctance. And let's not forget that royal patronage was as essential to the scholar as to the ruler (a kind of symbiosis) since the ruler profited from insights or even scientific breakthroughs that meant they could establish or even expand their rule while the scholar had the means to pursue the sciences and in relative safety. Many things happened along the way to change books and the way they are viewed. From papyrus and parchment to paper, from scrolls to books as we know them, from manuscripts to printing press, from storage in chests to lecterns to bookshelves, from items of wealth and status to mass produced items, from instruments of education to means of entertainment, from Latin to local languages, from serving select few to being available to the “unwashed” masses. What has never changed is the understanding of the power and danger of books — no wonder book burning (or its close cousin — book banning) are used to try to control add shape minds and attitudes.

I'm happy to report that there could be a revolution brewing about Germany's public libraries at last. Only last week, I read an (admittedly older) article about the transformation of German libraries into places where people can connect, linger and spend entire days doing all kinds of things. For those of you who are now scratching their heads going "yeah ... aren't they already?!" I can only say that you obviously come from a much better place than me (library-wise). *lol* It's not like what I read was a complete waste of time: I'm glad to know that as a consequence of the printing press, handwritten manuscripts in jewel-encrusted bindings lost a lot of their prestige as displays of wealth, so rich Italians in the sixteenth century instead showed off how rich they were by commissioning buildings, statues, and paintings, which after all are a lot more durable than ink on leather. A sweeping, absorbing history, deeply researched, of that extraordinary and enduring phenomenon: the library' – Richard Ovenden Famed across the known world,jealouslyguarded by private collectors, built up over centuries, destroyed in a single day, ornamented with gold leaf and frescoes,or filled with beanbags and children’s drawings—the history of the library is rich, varied, and stuffed full ofincident.In TheLibrary, historians AndrewPettegreeand Arthur derWeduwenintroduce us to the antiquarians and philanthropists who shaped the world’s great collections, trace theriseand fall ofliterarytastes, and reveal the high crimes and misdemeanors committed in pursuit of rare manuscripts.In doing so, they reveal that whilecollections themselves are fragile, often falling into ruinwithin a few decades, the idea of the library has been remarkably resilientas each generation makes—and remakes—theinstitution anew.

Get Notified

It then went into the impact on the Printing Press / Guttenberg and how that exploded the number of books and divide between Printed and transcribed. Interesting stories of how some of the early public collections were from private gifts at death and/or private collection used to pay off debt at death. I thought one of the key thoughts (and I'll butcher the exact quote) was that "no matter how Passionate the Collector, the collection/library was a mere burden to its recipients upon his passing". (This makes me thing of all the things I collect, books, sports memorabilia, etc that will probably just end up in the trash.) In 2010 I published an award-winning study of The Book in the Renaissance, and in 2014 The Invention of News: a study of the birth of a commercial culture of news publication in the four centuries between 1400 and 1800. I return to the Reformation for a study of Luther’s media strategy, published in 2015 by Penguin as Brand Luther, 1517, Printing and the Making of the Reformation. I am now engaged in a study of the book world of the seventeenth century Dutch Republic, to be published in 2019 as Trading Books in the Age of Rembrandt.

Clearly, the history of Christianity is one of bibliophilia, although that love does not extend to all books in the same way. This is not a cursory glance or an overview. It is a caring, in depth exploration into the history of collecting words on whatever material was used by human kind. And then how these collections of materials containing words were organized or managed, be it in a box, a trunk or, eventually a shelf or shelves or a room or a building. This book is a different approach to history. But of course libraries have only been this wonderful thing for a very short period of time. The idea of all the riffraff of my kind being allowed all that access to books — well, that idea would be very alien to the “connoisseurs” throughout history. Libraries weren’t for the idle pleasure or even the sharing of common knowledge; they were meant for the privileged few. In this book the authors trace the library history and the evolution of library from scholastic monastery collections to university collections and private hoards of book wealth to subscription libraries to wonderful public libraries as we know them. Andrew Pettegree holds a professorship at St Andrews University and is one of the leading experts on Europe during the Reformation. He is the author of The Invention of News , which won the Goldsmith Prize and Brand Luther, among other publications. Here are some recommendations for further reading from Andrew Pettegree, with a brief explanation of each book in his own words:Libraries really are wonderful. They’re better than bookshops, even. I mean bookshops make a profit on selling you books, but libraries just sit there lending you books quietly out of the goodness of their hearts.” ) It speaks of the central library of Cologne, which will be completely rebuilt by 2026. The architects mentioned in the article want libraries to become fully fledged "third locations" (the first being one's home, the second your school or place of work). What utterly intrigued me was the way that exactly what a library is FOR has changed over the centuries. I am a huge fan of the public library, and absolutely uphold its place as a community resource. I do know that in medieval Europe, libraries were the province of monasteries and nobles - not least because that reflects the literacy of the age, and also the aspirations of such people. The subtitle comes because the focus is on the tragedies of losing libraries. The loss of Alexandria is covered, of course; but the authors include other, less well known losses. The modern era could use a bit more development in terms of the section about the attempts of book challenges and bans that occur, not just in the US. It should be noted that bans and challenges are covered as are librarcides.

In this bonus, author interview, I sit down with historian Adrian Goldsworthy and discuss his most recent book: Rome and Persia: The Seven Hundred Year Rivalry. Reading Publics: New York City’s Public Libraries, 1754-1911, by Tom Glynn — NYPL Catalog ; Bookshare The only wish I had for this book is that they spent more time in Asia and talking through books there and how, even if very different, libraries existed and manifested. There is only passing references through the books outside of India and almost no color on Africa and Southeast Asia. In troubled times, book collecting became less important. Records of the dissolution of the monasteries give details about the furniture in the libraries, but there is very little about the books. Even in universities there were times when there was little interest in books. Why buy books if the next regime might destroy them? That money could be better spent on feasting. He was the only one of the family to survive what Francois Maurois, in his introduction, calls the "human holocaust" of the persecution of the Jews, which began with the restrictions, the singularization of the yellow star, the enclosure within the ghetto, and went on to the mass deportations to the ovens of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There are unforgettable and horrifying scenes here in this spare and sombre memoir of this experience of the hanging of a child, of his first farewell with his father who leaves him an inheritance of a knife and a spoon, and of his last goodbye at Buchenwald his father's corpse is already cold let alone the long months of survival under unconscionable conditions.In today's bonus author interview, I sit down with Moshik Temkin to discuss his most recent book on leadership: Warriors, Rebels, and Saints: The Art of Leadership from Machiavelli to Malcolm X. So lots of thought provoking questions here as well as history and bibliphilism (and as a true book lover and collector I also loved the portions about private collectors and the building of their collections). Libraries will continue to exist as long as people use their resources. A thriving library is managed effectively by people who work to understand the needs of their community and develop their collections to meet those current needs and anticipate future needs. They are forward thinking. Such a church will combine “a certain level of continuity with its cultural setting,” while also holding a loving, constructively critical posture toward that culture. It’s neither a baptized replica of whatever the local unbelievers think and do nor a curmudgeonly voice that only speaks in negative, condemnatory tones about its neighbors. The church inhabits culture differently. Carnegie was a significant donor to public library services, cannily insisting that town authorities would commit themselves, in perpetuity, to matching ten per cent of the value of his donation for the maintenance of the building and staff wages. Nor did he provide the books.

In this context, it was interesting to read of the emergence of publishers, the first of which was the Cambridge University Press, founded by Henry VIII in 1534. Around the same time but supposedly slightly later, the Schwabe Verlag in Switzerland and the House of Elzevir were also founded. In only 100 years since the invention of the printing press, more books had been produced than in the entire history of the written word up until that point! This also necessitated the regulation of the print trade.It’s not all doom and gloom. Spanning the collections of cuneiform tablets in Mesopotamia in royal palaces or temples, through the scholarly academy at the library of Alexandria, the manuscript glories of the monasteries, and the subsequent work of cathedral Chapters in establishing school and universities, the long history of the library before Gutenberg is celebrated here, while the vulnerability of such collections is always emphasised. For the past decade, Moshik Temkin has challenged his students at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government and around the world to grapple with the nature of leadership as part of his wildly popular course “Leaders and Leadership in History.” Now, in Warriors, Rebels, and Saints, Temkin refashions the classroom for a wider audience. Most of all , by empowering the digital revolution, librarians have given up the one unique selling point which they defended so tenaciously for almost as long as we have had libraries: the right to apply their knowledge, taste and discrimination to assisting the choice of their patrons. This has been the key to understanding so much in this book: the idea that in an age of plenty there will always be helpmates to assist readers in making the right choice of book. Can the internet, in all its enormous variety, ever replace this reflective process of deliberation, the slow choosing the eager anticipation, the slow unfolding of plot?" (and while impressive algorithms have made it easy to find "more of the same" - "What if we want something different, rather than more of the same? What if we do not know that we want something different, but a chance encounter sparks our interests?") We live in a period of leadership in crisis. At home, and across the globe, we sense that unqualified and irresponsible individuals are being elevated to positions of power, strong men and autocrats are consolidating their hold on governance, and the people are losing faith in the prospect of a better future. How have we arrived at this point? And how can we correct our course?