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08645_Field_TCGG T410.txt
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1996-04-10
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apprehending the motions of the author’s mind. The reader of
print, that is, stands in an utterly different relation to the
writer from the reader of manuscript. Print gradually made
reading aloud pointless, and accelerated the act of reading till
the reader could feel “in the hands of” his author. We shall see
that just as print was the first mass-produced thing, so it was
the first uniform and repeatable “commodity.” The assembly
line of movable types made possible a product that was
uniform and as repeatable as a scientific experiment. Such a
character does not belong to the manuscript. The Chinese in
printing from blocks in the eighth century, had been mainly
impressed by the repetitive character of print as “magical” and
had used it as an alternative form to the prayer wheel.
William Ivins has made a more thorough analysis of the
aesthetic effects of prints and typography on our human