Studies in Bibliography, v. 59 : Papers of the Bibliographical Society of the University of Virginia

The fifty-ninth volume of Studies in Bibliography continues its tradition of presenting a wide range of articles by international scholars on bibliography, textual criticism, and other aspects of the study of books. This volume opens with an excerpt from a forthcoming memoir by the eminent bibliographical and textual scholar G. Thomas Tanselle. Articles range in topic from the Middle Ages to the twentieth century and from manuscript production to the distribution of books by American bookstores. In a tour de force of bibliographical analysis, one piece examines the implications of inked pages that leave their images on adjacent leaves, and another provides new insights into the vexed question of the canon of Daniel Defoe. An advertisement for an early piracy of writings by Mark Twain and Bret Harte provides a springboard for a deeply contextual essay that demonstrates the complex interrelationships of the world of publishing and authorship, while another article on nineteenth-century books brings to light rare bindings issued by a major English publisher.