English Renaissance Printing Practice and Literature

Catalog description

This course investigates how English Renaissance literature was practically, creatively, and intellectually shaped by the printing press. The course provides hands-on learning of Renaissance printing practices, using a replica of a Gutenberg-style printing press. A number of approaches might be taken. For instance, students might explore the challenges of transferring a Renaissance manuscript into a printed artifact; or they might study a particular Renaissance literary movement and experiment with how it might be re-rendered in their own printing. At all times, our focus will be on English Renaissance printing press practices and why learning such practices still matters to us as students and scholars of Renaissance literature today.