Gutenberg Or The World S Benefactor

Volume 15 in The Complete Poetical Works of Robert Browning presents poetry Browning wrote in his seventies, his last two volumes: Parleyings (1887) and Asolando (1889). The former is the poet's last sustained meditation on life and on his times, a nine-section credo covering religion, history, poetry, politics, art, and music. Asolando is a coda to his whole oeuvre, a mixture of short love lyrics, historical monologues and anecdotes, light verse, and poems which are quite sui generis, all grouped around the theme of 'fancies and fact'. Both volumes are presented here with previously unknown sources, a wealth of new contextual material, and many textual nuances clarified, giving a fresh view of the last phase of Browning's career. What emerges is a poet more seriously Christian, Protestant, and Liberal than previously supposed, more interested in Britain's destiny and Empire, more enmeshed in the local battles of the 1880s?and a writer of considerable range and wit.

The mid-nineteenth century brought a revolution in popular and scholarly understandings of old and second-hand books. Manuals introduced new ideas and practices to increasing numbers of collectors, exhibitions offered opportunities previously unheard of, and scholars worked together to transform how the history of printing was understood. These dramatic changes would have profound consequences for bibliographical study and collecting, accompanied as they were by a proliferation in means of access. Many ideas arising during this time would even continue to exert their influence in the digitised arena of today. This book traces this revolution to its roots in commercial and personal ties between key players in England, France and beyond, illuminating how exhibitions, libraries, booksellers, scholars and popular writers all contributed to the modern world of book studies. For students and researchers, it offers an invaluable means of orientation in a field now once again undergoing deep and wide-ranging transformations.