Des livres qui parlent: paratexte et publicité au début du 16e siècle
| Pages | 61-68 |
|---|---|
| Keywords | Dedicatory Poem – Book Dedication – Humanist Poetry |
| Citation | KISS, Farkas Gábor . Des livres qui parlent: paratexte et publicité au début du 16e siècle. Acta Musei Nationalis Pragae – Historia litterarum. Prague: National Museum, 2012, 57(3), 61-68. ISSN 0036-5351. Also available from: https://publikace.nm.cz/en/periodicals/amnphl/57-3/des-livres-qui-parlent-paratexte-et-publicite-au-debut-du-16e-sicle |
As the number of published books multiplied during the second half of the 15th century, printers and editors were constantly in search of new methods to raise public attention to the own publications, and ultimately, to have the readers buy their books. Paratexts (dedications, dedicatory poems, title page illustrations) were one of the most important tools by which the future readers could easily identify the content and the social or scientific significance of the book. In this study, I examine the poems, where the book speaks (Libellus loquitur), one of the typical paratexts of the books published around 1500. I argue that it were not only the ancient literary models of such introductory poems (Ovid, Martial) which defined this genre in the Renaissance, but also the heritage of medieval manuscript culture (the handwritten colophons of the scribes) and the medieval ways of reading, deeply rooted in Christian spirituality (the divina lectio) exerted significant influence on the evolution of these poems.
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