McKerrow 1928

R.B. McKerrow. An Introduction to Bibliography for Literary Students. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1928.

• written at the high point of New Bibliography -- W.W. Greg et al.
• Intro - "...in all work so transmitted [by print] there has intervened between the mind and pen of the original author and the printed text as we have it now a whole series of processes, often carved out by persons of no literary knowledge or interests.... [T]hat a thorough understanding of these processes was a necessary preliminary to any attempt to reconstruct from the printed book the text as originally conceived"
  • Platonic Text, in line with Greg et al., superceded in methods, epistemology and ends by McKenzie 1986, McGann 1991, Chartier 1994, etc.
• 3-4 "exact knowledge of the way in which books are produced is necessary... [we must see the book from the] point of view of those who composed, corrected, printed, folded, and bound it" -> the result of a series of processes
  • still very technologically/production deterministic
• 4 The material book, apart altogether from its literary content, can be a thing of surprising interest
  • later with De Grazia & Stallybrass 1993 we see that "literary content" is inseparable from materiality, too
• 5 With "almost every new book we take up we are in new country, unexplored and trackless, and that yet such discoveries as we make are real discoveries"
• 146 McKerrow's form for basic bibliographic description:
  • Exact title (noting everything on page, each line an independent unit)
  • colophon - location, printer, year
  • format (by looking at paper)
  • collation -> signatures and leaves
  • notes
  • collection (library)