Gods, Devils, and Gutenberg: The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Printing Press

Abstract

Gods, Devils, and Gutenberg: The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Printing Press ELIZABETH L. EISENSTEIN My subtitle, "The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Printing Press," was selected with Frank Manuel's The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Gods in mind. The idea of juxtaposing pagan Gods with the printing press is not quite as bizarre as it may seem to be at first glance. The wooden hand press now appears to be a relatively prosaic instrument—the sort of thing one might find in a museum of technology alongside other antique tools. But this was not the case in the eighteenth century when it was endowed with quasi-mystical powers and was the focal point for elaborate mythologizing. Graphic evidence that pagan gods were associated with Gutenberg's invention is not hard to find. Let us look, for example, at the frontispiece of a commemorative history of printing published in 1740 (fig. 1). A god and a goddess: Mercury and Minerva (the latter accompanied by identifying helmet and owl), escort the wooden handpress in its descent from the heavens toward earth. There it is awaited by figures embodying the five nations: Germany, Holland, England, Italy and France. Each nation holds a medallion honoring early printers: Germany holds Gutenberg and Fust; Holland, Coster; England, Caxton; Italy, Aldus Manutius and France, Robert Estienne. (The choice of printers will be discussed later.) This conception of printing as a gift from the gods, entrusted to a heroic generation of master craftsmen, was a heritage from earlier centuries . In 1515, a censorship decree was issued by Pope Leo X. It warned Figure 1. "The Spirit of Printing Descending from the Heavens." Engraved by Jacob van der Schley. Frontispiece. Prosper Marchand, Histoire de l'origine et des premiers progrès de l'imprimerie, The Hague: Pierre Paupie, 1740. Courtesy of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division, Library of Congress. The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Printing Press / 3 against abusing the new powers of the press but also described printing as a God-given invention which descended from the heavens. The title of the 1740 frontispiece: "the spirit of printing descending from the heavens" thus echoed an earlier papal decree, which is not without irony since its designer was committed to an anti-papist cause. The second part of this talk will be concerned with variations on the theme of printing as a divine art which gave promise of ushering in a new golden age. But, as my title suggests, not all eighteenth-century literati thought first of the heavens when they considered the operations of the wooden hand press. Some had a darker vision of devils at work—as can be seen from the engraving which appeared in two successive issues of The Grub-Street Journal published in October 1732 (fig.2). This print was produced some seventy years ago in Ralph Straus's old study of the much hated and much abused publisher-bookseller The Unspeakable Curll.1 Recent years have seen several new studies devoted to Curll who seems to appeal to the post-modern imagination as a kind of literary anti-hero. The disgusting and much discussed story of Pope's giving Curll an emetic has been made to yield unexpected significance in a new treatment by Eric Chandler. David Saunders and Ian Hunter's article, "Lessons from the Literatory," depicts the print as a caricature of Curll wearing a monster suit and performing multiple roles as pamphleteer, journalist, printer, publisher, pornographer and literary agent.2 No doubt Curll is a key figure for anyone investigating the good author/ bad bookseller myth which loomed so large in eighteenth century England— a myth recently discussed by Dustin Griffin.3 No doubt Curll is the butt of several of the visual jokes that are contained in this particular satiric print. But the significance of the caricature is not confined to scoring points against the bookseller who became notorious as Pope's bête noire (and who appears in the print costumed as a bête noire). The texts that run beneath the images indicate a wider range of concerns. The disreputable aspects of popular journalism loom large, but other topics are also discussed. Of particular interest here...