Much ink has been spilled lamenting or championing the decline of printed books. In Book Was There, Andrew Piper shows that the rich history of reading itself offers unexpected clues to what lies in store for books - print or digital. From medieval manuscript books to today's interactive urban ficti[...]

At the opening of the nineteenth century, publishing houses in London, New York, Paris, Stuttgart, and Berlin produced books in ever greater numbers. But it was not just the advent of mass printing that created the era's 'bookish' culture. According to Andrew Piper, romantic writers played a crucial[...]