Print Culture

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Print Culture and the Modern World

1. Discuss early print in:


a) China:
The earliest kind of print technology was developed in China, Japan and Korea.
From AD 594, books in China were printed by rubbing paper against the inked surface of woodblocks.
As both sides of the thin, porous sheet could not be printed, the traditional Chinese ‘accordion book’ was
folded and stitched at the side.
Superbly skilled craftsmen could duplicate, with remarkable accuracy, the beauty of calligraphy.
The imperial state in China was, for a very long time, the major producer of printed material. China
possessed a huge bureaucratic system which recruited its personnel through civil service examinations.
Textbooks for this examination were printed in vast numbers under the sponsorship of the imperial state.
b) Japan:
Buddhist missionaries from China introduced hand-printing technology into Japan around AD 768-770.
The oldest Japanese book, printed in AD 868, is the Buddhist Diamond Sutra, containing six sheets of text
and woodcut illustrations.
Pictures were printed on textiles, playing cards and paper money.
In medieval Japan, poets and prose writers were regularly published, and books were cheap and abundant.
Kitagawa Utamaro, born in Edo (Tokyo) was widely known for his contributions to an art form called ukiyo
(‘pictures of the floating world’) or depiction of ordinary human experiences, especially urban ones.
c) Europe:
In the eleventh century, Chinese paper reached Europe through silk route. In 1295, Marco Polo returned to
Italy the technology of woodblock printing from China. Now Italians began producing books with
woodblocks, and soon the technology spread to other parts of Europe. Luxury editions were still handwritten
on very expensive vellum, meant for aristocratic circles and rich monastic libraries.
2. Describe Johann Gutenberg printing press.
Ans. Johann Gutenberg from Strasbourg, Germany developed the first-known printing press in the 1430s.
From his childhood he had seen wine and olive presses. He learnt the art of polishing stones, became a
master goldsmith, and also acquired the expertise to create lead moulds used for making trinkets. The olive
press provided the model for the printing press, and moulds were used for casting the metal types for the
letters of the alphabet. By 1448, Gutenberg perfected the system. The first book he printed was the Bible.
About 180 copies were printed and it took three years to produce them.
3. Print introduced a new world of debate and discussion. Discuss.
Print created the possibility of wide circulation of ideas, and introduced a new world of debate and
discussion. Not everyone welcomed the printed book, . It was feared that if there was no control over what
was printed and read then rebellious and irreligious thoughts might spread.
In 1517, the religious reformer Martin Luther wrote Ninety Five Theses criticising many of the practices and
rituals of the Roman Catholic Church. A printed copy of this was posted on a church door in Wittenberg. It
challenged the Church to debate his ideas. Luther’s writings were immediately reproduced in vast numbers
and read widely. This lead to a division within the Church and to the beginning of the Protestant
Reformation. Luther’s translation of the New Testament sold 5,000 copies within a few weeks. Luther said,
‘Printing is the ultimate gift of God and the greatest one.’
Menocchio, a miller in Italy, reinterpreted the message of the Bible and formulated a view of God and
Creation that enraged the Roman Catholic Church. Menocchio was executed for his heretical ideas (Beliefs
which do not follow the accepted teachings of the Church). The Roman Church, troubled by such effects of
popular readings and questionings of faith, imposed severe controls over publishers and booksellers and
began to maintain an Index of Prohibited Books from 1558.
4. ‘Tremble, therefore, tyrants of the world! Tremble before the virtual writer!’
Who said this and why?
Ans. By the mid-eighteenth century, many believed that books could change the world, liberate society from
despotism and tyranny. Books would herald a time when reason and intellect would rule. Louise-Sebastien
Mercier, a novelist in eighteenth-century France, declared: ‘The printing press is the most powerful engine
of progress and public opinion is the force that will sweep despotism away.’ In many of Mercier’s novels,
the heroes are transformed by acts of reading. They devour books, are lost in the world books create, and
become enlightened in the process. Mercier proclaimed: ‘Tremble, therefore, tyrants of the world! Tremble
before the virtual writer!’
5. Many historians have argued that print culture created the conditions within which French
Revolution occurred. Justify the statement.
Ans.
1. Print popularised the ideas of the Enlightenment thinkers like Voltaire and Rousseau. They argued
for the rule of reason rather than custom, and demanded that everything be judged through the
application of reason, rationality, questioning, critical thinking. They attacked the sacred authority of
the Church and the despotic power of the state.
2. Print created a new culture of dialogue and debate. All values, norms and institutions were re-
evaluated and discussed by a public that had become aware of the power of reason, and recognised
the need to question existing ideas and beliefs.
3. By 1780s literature mocked the royalty and criticised their morality. Cartoons and caricatures
typically suggested that the monarchy remained absorbed only in sensual pleasures while the
common people suffered immense hardships. This literature circulated underground and led to the
growth of nationalism.
6. State the impact of print in the 19th century Europe on the following:
a) Among Children: As primary education became compulsory from the late nineteenth century, children
became an important category of readers. A children’s press, devoted to literature for children alone, was set
up in France in 1857. This press published new works as well as old fairy tales and folk tales. The Grimm
Brothers in Germany spent years compiling traditional folk tales gathered from peasants. Anything that was
considered unsuitable for children or would appear vulgar to the elites, was not included in the published
version.
b) Among Women: Penny magazines, chapbooks were especially meant for women, as were manuals
teaching proper behaviour and housekeeping. When novels began to be written in the nineteenth century,
women were seen as important readers. Some of the bestknown novelists were women: Jane Austen, the
Bronte sisters, George Eliot. Their writings became important in defining a new type of woman: a person
with will, strength of personality, determination and the power to think.
c) Among Workers: Lending libraries in England became instruments for educating white-collar workers,
artisans and lower-middle-class people. Sometimes, self-educated working-class people wrote for
themselves. As working hours shortened from the mid-nineteenth century, workers had some time for self-
improvement and self-expression. They wrote political tracts and autobiographies in large numbers. Eg.
Thomas Wood, a Yorkshire mechanic, narrated how he would rent old newspapers and read them by firelight
in the evenings. Maxim Gorky, Russian writer, wrote ‘My Childhood’ and ‘My University’.
7. What were the problems in the use of manuscripts?
Ans. Manuscripts are handwritten documents on bark of birch tress or palm leaves. They were highly
expensive and fragile. They had to be handled carefully, and they could not be read easily as the script was
written in different styles.
8. From the early nineteenth century, there were intense debates around religious issues in India. Enumerate
the statement.
From the early nineteenth century, printed tracts and newspapers not only spread the new ideas, but they
shaped the nature of the debate. A wider public could now participate in these public discussions and express
their views.
There was intense controversies between social and religious reformers and the Hindu orthodoxy over
matters like widow immolation, monotheism, Brahmanical priesthood and idolatry.
Rammohun Roy published the Sambad Kaumudi from 1821 and the Hindu orthodoxy commissioned the
Samachar Chandrika to oppose his opinions.
In north India, the ulama were deeply anxious about the collapse of Muslim dynasties. They feared that
colonial rulers would encourage conversion, change the Muslim personal laws. To counter this, they used
cheap lithographic presses, published Persian and Urdu translations of holy scriptures, and printed religious
newspapers and tracts.
The Deoband Seminary, founded in 1867, published thousands of fatwas telling Muslim readers how to
conduct themselves in their everyday lives, and explaining the meanings of Islamic doctrines.
9. What did the spread of print culture in nineteenth century India mean to:
a) Among Women: Women’s reading increased enormously in middle-class homes. Liberal husbands and
fathers began educating their womenfolk at home, and sent them to schools when women’s schools were set
up in the cities and towns after the mid-nineteenth century.
Conservative Hindus believed that a literate girl would be widowed and Muslims feared that educated
women would be corrupted by reading.
Rashsundari Debi, a young married girl in a very orthodox household from Bengal, learnt to read in the
secrecy of her kitchen. Later, she wrote her autobiography Amar Jiban.
Kailashbashini Debi wrote books highlighting the experiences of women – about how women were
imprisoned at home, kept in ignorance, forced to do hard domestic labour and treated unjustly by the very
people they served.
Tarabai Shinde and Pandita Ramabai wrote with passionate anger about the miserable lives of upper-caste
Hindu women, especially widows.
Rokeya Hossein wrote the book ‘Sultana’s Dream’. She encouraged the need for education for women.
Ram Chaddha published the fast-selling Istri Dharm Vichar and the Khalsa Tract Society published cheap
booklets to teach women how to be obedient wives.
b) Among Poor, Low Caste, Workers: Very cheap small books were brought to markets in nineteenth-
century Madras towns and sold at crossroads, allowing poor people travelling to markets to buy them. Public
libraries were set up from the early twentieth century, expanding the access to books.
Jyotiba Phule wrote about the injustices of the caste system in his Gulamgiri. In the twentieth century,
B.R.Ambedkar in Maharashtra and E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker (Periyar) in Madras, wrote powerfully on
caste. Local protest movements created a lot of popular journals and tracts criticising ancient scriptures and
envisioning a new and just future.
Workers in factories were too overworked and lacked the education to write much about their experiences.
Kashibaba, a Kanpur millworker, wrote and published Chhote Aur Bade Ka Sawal in 1938 to show the links
between caste and class exploitation. The poem collection of a Kanpur millworker, who wrote under the
name of Sudarshan Chakr, were published as Sacchi Kavitayan.
Extra Questions:
Print and Censorship:
Early measures to control printed matter were directed against Englishmen in India who were critical of
Company misrule and hated the actions of particular Company officers.
1820s, the Calcutta Supreme Court passed certain regulations to control press freedom and the Company
began encouraging publication of newspapers that would celebrate British rule.
After the revolt of 1857, Englishmen demanded a clamp down on the ‘native’ press. In 1878, the Vernacular
Press Act was passed, modelled on the Irish Press Laws. It provided the government with extensive rights to
censor reports and editorials in the vernacular press. When a report was judged as seditious, the newspaper
was warned, and if the warning was ignored, the press was liable to be seized and the printing machinery
confiscated.
However, nationalist newspapers grew in numbers in all parts of India. They reported on colonial misrule
and encouraged nationalist activities. Eg. When Punjab revolutionaries were deported in 1907, Bal
Gangadhar Tilak wrote with great sympathy about them in his Kesari.
‘By the seventeenth century, as urban culture bloomed in China, the uses of print diversified’. Explain
the statement by giving suitable examples. (question from present sample paper)
Ans. Print was no longer used just by scholar officials. Merchants used print in their everyday life, as they
collected trade information. Reading increasingly became a leisure activity. The new readership preferred
fictional narratives, poetry, autobiographies, anthologies of literary masterpieces, and romantic plays. Rich
women began to read, and many women began publishing their poetry and plays. Wives of scholar-officials
published their works and courtesans wrote about their lives. This new reading culture was accompanied by
a new technology. Western printing techniques and mechanical presses were imported in the late nineteenth
century as Western powers established their outposts in China. Shanghai became the hub of the new print
culture, catering to the Western-style schools. From hand printing there was now a gradual shift to
mechanical printing.
Early print in India:
The printing press first came to Goa with Portuguese missionaries in the mid-sixteenth century. Jesuit priests
learnt Konkani and translated the Bible in vernacular language.
From 1780, James Augustus Hickey began to edit the Bengal Gazette, a weekly magazine. Hickey published
a lot of advertisements, including those that related to the import and sale of slaves. But he also published a
lot of gossip about the Company’s senior officials in India. Enraged by this, Governor-General Warren
Hastings persecuted Hickey.
The first to appear Indian weekly newspaper was the Bengal Gazette, brought out by Gangadhar
Bhattacharya.
New technological innovations in print in the 19th & 20th Century:
By the mid-nineteenth century, Richard M. Hoe of New York had perfected the power-driven cylindrical
press. This was capable of printing 8,000 sheets per hour. This press was particularly useful for printing
newspapers.
In the late nineteenth century, the offset press was developed which could print up to six colours at a time.
Methods of feeding paper improved, the quality of plates became better, automatic paper reels and
photoelectric controls of the colour register were introduced.
Nineteenth-century periodicals serialised important novels, which gave birth to a particular way of writing
novels. Eg. Shilling series in England.
The dust cover or the book jacket is also a twentieth-century innovation.

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