Table of Contents

1: James Raven: Introduction
2: Eleanor Robson: The Ancient World
3: Barbara Crostini: Byzantium
4: Cynthia Brokaw: Medieval and Early Modern East Asia
5: David Rundle: Medieval Western Europe
6: James Raven and Goran Proot: Renaissance and Reformation
7: Ann Blair: Managing Information
8: Sheila S. Blair and Jonathan M. Bloom: The Islamic World
9: Jeffrey Freedman: Enlightenment and Revolution
10: Graham Shaw: South Asia
11: Marie-Françoise Cachin: Industrialization
12: Christopher A. Reed and M. William Steele: Modern China, Japan, and Korea
13: Eva Hemmungs Wirtén: Globalization
14: Jeffrey T. Schnapp: Books Transformed
Abbreviations and Glossary
Further Reading
Picture Acknowledgements
Index

About the Author

James Raven is Professor of Modern History at the University of Essex and a Fellow of Magdalene College, Cambridge. Formerly he was Reader in Social and Cultural History, University of Oxford, and Professorial Fellow of Mansfield College. He is the author, editor and co-editor of numerous books in early modern and modern British, European and colonial history, including Judging New Wealth (1992); The Practice and Representation of Reading (1996);
The English Novel 1770-1829 (2000); Free Print and Non-Commercial Publishing (2000); London Booksellers and American Customers (2002); Lost Libraries (2004); The Business of Books: Booksellers and the English Book Trade
(2007); Books between Europe and the Americas (2011); Publishing Business (2014) and Bookscape: Geographies of Printing and Publishing in London before 1800 (2014).

Reviews

[A] brilliant book... illustrated with the most sumptuous photographic images of books ancient and modern.
*Kathryn Hughes, The Mail on Sunday*

This book will become an invaluable point of departure for students new to the field, for scholars who need to venture outside their normal chronological and geographical comfort zones, and - as it should be - to that elusive general reader.
*John Feather, Library & Information History*

Raven... has drawn together scholarly essays offering a sweeping, erudite, and thoroughly engaging narrative... A profusely illustrated, handsomely produced intellectual history.
*Kirkus, Starred Review*

Together, these fourteen essays form a thorough picture of how and why books progressed along the lines that they did. In an age when books are once again experiencing momentous changes, this well-researched reminder of their durability and timelessness is very welcome.
*Eileen Gonzalez, Foreword Reviews*

This volume is a cultural biography of the book, taking a global view of its underlying function as a portable, durable conveyor of reproducible information... Other works trace the history of the book, but Oxford's treatment is a deeper, more multicultural, and more visually appealing approach.
*Lesley Farmer, Booklist*

Beautifully comprehensively illustrated history of the book... the essays are stimulating and thought provoking. This is a scholarly work but it's also a coffee table book intended to be widely read and accessible. This is a very well curated collection... Fascinating and beautiful.
*Paul Burke, NB Magazine*

This is an excellent compilation on the world-wide history of the book... beautifully illustrated... Put it on your Christmas present list.
*Prof. T.D. Wilson, Information Research*

Beautifully illustrated, The Oxford Illustrated History of the Book is a seminal and original work of meticulous scholarship
*Midwest Book Review*

A sumptuous production.
*Liz Dexter, Shiny New Books*

[A] handsome and carefully edited volume... which gratifyingly offers the reader so many opportunities to reflect on our words and the impact of their normally accepted meanings.
*Kristian Jensen, The Library*