Language Arts & Disciplines

When Kenneth Burke conceived his celebrated “Motivorum” project in the 1940s and 1950s, he envisioned it in three parts. Whereas the third part, A Symbolic of Motives, was never finished, A Grammar of Motives (1945) and A Rhetoric of Motives (1950) have become canonical theoretical documents.
 
A Rhetoric of Motives was originally intended to be a two-part book. Here, at last, is the second volume, the until-now unpublished War of Words, where Burke brilliantly exposes the rhetorical devices that sponsor war in the name of peace. Discouraging militarism during the Cold War even as it catalogues belligerent persuasive strategies and tactics that remain in use today, The War of Words reveals how popular news media outlets can, wittingly or not, foment international tensions and armaments during tumultuous political periods. This authoritative edition includes an introduction from the editors explaining the compositional history and cultural contexts of both The War of Words and A Rhetoric of Motives. The War of Words illuminates the study of modern rhetoric even as it deepens our understanding of post–World War II politics.

 

The problems of international communication and linguistic rights are recurring debates in the present-day age of globalization. But the debate truly began over a hundred years ago, when the increasingly interconnected world of the nineteenth century fostered a desire for the development of a global lingua franca. Many individuals and social movements competed to create an artificial language unencumbered by the political rivalries that accompanied English, German, and French. Organizations including the American Philosophical Society, the International Association of Academies, the International Peace Bureau, the Comintern, and the League of Nations intervened in the debate about the possibility of an artificial language, but of the numerous tongues created before World War II, only Esperanto survives today.

Esperanto and Its Rivals sheds light on the factors that led almost all artificial languages to fail and helped English to prevail as the global tongue of the twenty-first century. Exploring the social and political contexts of the three most prominent artificial languages—Volapük, Esperanto, and Ido—Roberto Garvía examines the roles played by social movement leaders and inventors, the strategies different organizations used to lobby for each language, and other early decisions that shaped how those languages spread and evolved. Through the rise and fall of these artificial languages, Esperanto and Its Rivals reveals the intellectual dilemmas and political anxieties that troubled the globalizing world at the turn of the twentieth century.

The fifteenth century, one of the most curious and confused periods in recorded history, witnessed amazing developments in the printing industry and in the production of books. The present volume surveys the history of the manufacture of books throughout the fifteenth century, whether written by hand or produced by the press, and points out that both methods faced very similar problems and found almost identical solutions for them.

Actually, the fifteenth century itself saw no material difference between manuscripts and incunabula (fifteenth-century printings), and regarded the latter simply as codices produced by "a new method of artificial writing." Curt F. Bühler discusses the impact of the epoch-making invention on the scribes as well as the attitudes that the contemporary book-lovers adopted toward the products of the press.

The author also studies the types of men who were attracted to the new industry and the nature of the books that they believed to be readily vendible. In addition, certain familiar beliefs regarding the history of the early presses are challenged, and possible solutions are presented for the problems are still imperfectly understood.

To illustrate the text, beautiful reproductions of illuminated manuscript pages, printed pages, colophons, woodcut illustration, and early typefaces have been included. The author's discussion of the decoration in books is not so much a study in the fine arts but, rather, an analysis of the types of volumes which lent themselves to decoration, and the various forms of such work.

Three distinguished authorities offer informed reflections on the history of books, on literary commerce, and on the reading public in eighteenth-century England, France, and Germany. Concerned with an area of study that has gone largely unexplored—the social function of the book trade and the various agencies of distribution—Robert Darnton. Roy M. Wiles, and Bernhard Fabian lay the groundwork for the intellectual, social, and literary historian as well as the student of political revolutions.

Robert Darnton's rich account of a clandestine book dealer expands our knowledge of the actual habits of eighteenth-century Frenchmen. We learn about the livres philosophiques, as they were known in the trade—obscene. irreligious. or seditious works; about the intricate circuit of agents linking publisher and bookdealer; and about a confidence game often surviving on sheer bravura. Darnton not only gives us a general sense of the literary tastes in a small provincial city in France on the eve of the Revolution but also opens the way toward an understanding of the country's entire literary underground.

The late Roy M. Wiles investigates the principal readership in eighteenth-century England and demonstrates that intellectual activities were not confined to polite society in London. Employing new, often untouched materials—newspaper circulation and delivery figures, book lists and advertisements in London and local papers, subscription books in provincial towns and cities—Wiles helps dispel some of the uncertainty surrounding the question of literacy and shows that, in fact, what the provincial readers chose to read more accurately registers the eighteenth century's relish for reading than those books considered by Londoners as "required" reading.

Bernhard Fabian explores the sources that permit us to assess the circulation of English letters in Germany during the second half of the eighteenth century. By considering the kind of information obtained from subscription lists, by studying the relation of English literature to the general reader of the period, and by examining the emergence of a reading public that actually read English, Fabian helps delineate a broad view of the contemporary reading scene in eighteenth-century Germany.

The area in which people speak Urdu as their mother tongue includes east and west Pakistan (where, with Bangali, it functions as the official language of the land) and northern India. The language in this volume is based on the Urdu dialect of the educated population of Pakistan.

The purpose of the book is to provide the basic grammatical equipment and vocabulary necessary to conduct oneself in areas of Pakistan and India in which Urdu is the language of communication. Developed over a period of fifteen years, it is designed for students who have little or nor linguistic training.

In this learned and delightful book, John L. Lievsay shows how energetic English printers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries helped to bring the language and literature of Italy into England. His description of how these men, who were not usually troubled by modesty and sometimes not by honesty, capitalized on and helped to create the Englishman's appetite for things Italian will be welcomed by scholars; his analysis of the contents of libraries and catalogues and his commentary on the books themselves will be relished by those who enjoy the scholarship and the gossip behind the collecting and printing of books.

In his first essay, "English Printers, Italian Texts," the author identifies the printers and the variety of Italian authors. Torriano's proverbs and Florio's language manuals met a receptive audience. John Wolfe published Pietro Aretino under false imprint, inventing fictional places of publication, and his printings of Machiavelli, suppressed in Italy and not generally available in translation, were highly successful. John Bill, King's Printer, even published an Italian translation of Bacon's Essay.

Lievsay then turns to the Italian titles found in library collections of the time, among them Thomas James's catalogs of the Bodleian Library, the bookseller Robert Martin's lists, and the libraries of eminent Englishmen, including those of John Locke and Sir Edward Coke. Lord Herbert's library held a book by "Partenio Etiro," an anagram for Aretino. The work of Tomaso Garzoni has been neglected, but Lievsay revives it in the third essay with descriptions of Garzoni's immensely popular Piazza and Theatro; and quotations from his Mirabile cornutopia—a mock letter of consolation to cuckolds—are evidence of the high spirit of this learned and bizarre man.

The essays are based on lectures given at the University of Pennsylvania in the spring of 1969 for the A. S. W. Rosenbach Fellowship in Bibliography.

This descriptive catalogue of the western manuscripts dating to 1800 housed in the libraries of the University of Pennsylvania was begun in 1960 and was printed in six issues of The Library Chronicle. Actual use of the catalogue led to the revision of some of the entries, additions, and corrections which are incorporated in the present volume. One hundred and seventeen manuscripts are described here for the first time. The manuscripts are described in the order in which they were placed on the shelves, a common but not a logical arrangement. The compilers, therefore, have prepared an extensive index listing title entries; names of authors, scribes, and owners; persons referred to in the text; names of places and countries, as well as other entries deemed useful.

The catalogue includes the manuscripts of the Rare Book Collection, Henry C. Lea Library, Edgar F. Smith Collection, and the Veterinary Library. Greatly facilitating access to the resources of the University Libraries, the catalogue also provides an intriguing description of bibliographical riches.

United States Government publications are books collectors have not sought, bibliographers have not analyzed, historians have rarely considered. But publication is a necessary part of law-making and law-enforcing, and as the historian J. H. Powell traces national printing through its first forty years (until the British fired the capital in 1814) these dry-as-dust public documents become vivid, exciting elements in the lively story of how a new nation was built.

In this volume collectors will find many "firsts" in public documents, bibliographers will discover unknown chapters in the history of printing in America, and historians will be challenged by the new points of view government publications suggest for interpreting national history.

Lecture I describes the printing of the Continental Congress before Independence, 1774-1176. Lecture II deals with official publications during the Revolution, 1776-1787, the printing history of the Federal Convention of 1787, and public issues of the new government during its sojourn in New York and Philadelphia, 1789-1800. Lecture III describes publication problems in the new capital, Washington City, the printing contracts and contractors, the complex process of drafting and emitting the laws for a free people to know and understand. Books—even statutes, reports, debates, such books as a government makes—are bits of human history, each with a story of its own. As Dr. Powell makes clear in these lectures, which bring to light one of the largest, most important, but most neglected subjects in American Studies, the charm of any book comes partly from the men behind it, in this case men new to American history but bound to become familiar as the field opened up by these lectures is more thoroughly explored: Adolphus Washington Greely, the Polar explorer; Samuel A. Otis, the elegant Secretary of the Senate; Roger Chew Weightman, the boy printer in Washington; Clerk Beckley of the House whom the playing fields of Eton had prepared for Jeffersonian party battles; and the printers, the politicians, the civil and military servants of the government as it grew from small beginnings to what Hamilton finally described as—"majestic, efficient, and operative of great things."

"Worth had courage and originality enough not to take pictures for granted, but thought and struggled with some of the most difficult problems that cinematographers (and researchers in visual media) are faced with."—Edward T. Hall

One of the central figures in the development of the study of visual communication, Sol Worth (1922-1977) was a filmmaker and painter before he turned to academic pursuits. He began with the question of how film could be understood and studied as a medium of communication and from there he moved on to the larger and more profound questions about the nature of visual media in general and the role that visual images play in shaping and constructing reality. Worth's pioneering work with Navajo filmmakers broadened our understanding of visual perception and communication even as it presented anthropologists with a means to achieve one of their most cherished goals: somehow to see the world through the eyes of their informants.

The papers in this volume trace the development of Worth's thinking and research as he outlined the problems and issues that must be faced in the study of visual communication. He went further than anyone else in setting the intellectual agenda for the field, drawing upon such diverse disciplines as anthropology, sociology, psychology, linguistics, and semiotics. His broader interests are reflected in several papers that apply to problems and concerns of a more practical nature. Among them is Worth's innovative paper on the use of film in education.

Worth's contributions to the serious task of understanding the role and potential of visual media and visual communication extend far beyond the intellectual realms of theory and speculation. Indeed, they speak clearly to issues facing all of us in a world that is so much shaped by visual communication.

The lineage of American schoolbooks, like that of our educational system, goes back to Europe and, particularly, to England. The first schoolbooks used in the United States were printed in England and for two hundred years a great influx of books came from sources outside this country. However, with the break from England and the emergence of the United States as a nation, text book publishing came into being in America.

This book presents a general portrayal of American textbooks, and along with this, as a requisite accompaniment, a picture of the pioneer-day school system insofar as it had to do with production and early usage of schoolbooks. The author shows how the first textbooks came to be, tells of textbook writers, and traces through the bulk of the material presented the changes that most of the textbook authors brought about. The types of books discussed include the New England primers as well as other types of primers; readers, specially the McGuffey readers; rhetoric and foreign language books; arithmetics; spelling books; literature texts; elocution texts; handwriting and copy books; histories; and many other books that made our school systems what they are today.

Besides being a study of the textbook field in America, History of American Schoolbooks is also a history of the United States as reflected in the type of teaching and instructional aids used to educate Americans. A study of this subject is by no means just an interesting side trip into America's past. Many of the books are still influential, and many of the old methods are staging a come­back in the educational field,

History of American Schoolbooks should be of interest to educators and historians, as well as teachers, librarians, book collectors, publishers, and general readers who are interested in the evolution and growth of a segment of education and educational publishing that is one of the most important and vital in our country.

Bibliography and Modern Book Production is a fascinating historic journey through the fields of print history, librarianship and publishing. It covers key developments from 1494 to 1949 in bibliography and book production from the history of scripts and paper manufacture to the origins of typefaces and printing. Although not a textbook, the book was a guide for library students in the 1950s on the essential literature of librarianship.

As the first librarian appointed to Wits University in 1929, Percy Freer’s near encyclopaedic knowledge of the subject of bibliography enabled him to develop a key resource for relevant library examinations in South Africa and abroad. Due to its immense value as a historic record, and to acknowledge Freer’s contributions as scholar, librarian and publisher, it is being reissued as part of the Wits University Press Re/Presents series to make it accessible to scholars in book histories, publishing studies and information science.

In 2022 Wits University Press marked its centenary, making it the oldest, most established university press in sub-Saharan Africa. While in part modelled on scholarly publishers from the global North, it has had to contend with the constraints of working under global South conditions: marginalisation within the university, budgetary limitations, small local markets, unequal access to international sales channels, and the privileging of English language publishing over indigenous languages.

This volume explores what the Press has achieved, and what its modes of reinvention might look like. In widening and deepening our understanding of the Press as an example of a global South scholarly publisher, this volume asks how publishing can contribute to a broader understanding of Southern knowledge production. Featuring contributions from scholars, publishers and authors this multi-voiced volume showcases the history of the Press’s publishing activities over 100 years: from documenting its evolution through book covers and giving credence to some of the leading black intellectuals and writers of the early 20th century and the success of those works in spite of their authors’ racial marginalisation, to the role of women, both in publishing and in the spaces afforded to women’s writing on the Press’s list.

The collection concludes with essays by contemporary authors who detail not only their experiences of working with Southern publishers, but also the politics and influences governing their decisions to choose the Press over a Northern publisher. Publishing from the South shows the strategies deployed by the Press to professionalise Southern knowledge making, and in the process demonstrating how university presses in the global South support the scholarly missions of their universities for both local and global audiences.

". . . An essential, unique, and thoroughly 'user friendly' instructional reference and guide that should be an integral part of every author and every publisher's professional book marketing plan instructional reference collection." - Midwest Book Review

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The Technique of the Mystery Story (1914) is a book by Carolyn Wells. Before she began writing her Detective Fleming Stone series of mystery novels, Carolyn Wells was a published poet, accomplished children’s author, and professional jingle writer. In the middle of her career, she heard a mystery story by Anna Katharine Green and was instantly hooked. Through years of practice and attention to the craft, she earned a reputation as a leading fiction writer of her generation, an adept craftswoman whose stories appeared in some of the leading newspapers and magazines of the day. “Why is the detective story? To entertain, to interest, to amuse. It has no deeper intent, no more subtle raison d'être than to give pleasure to its readers.” Writing is a simple act, requiring only the mind, a pen, and a piece of paper. But how does one write well, grabbing the reader’s attention and ensuring their time will be rewarded by the end of the story? In The Technique of the Mystery Story, Carolyn Wells cuts to the core of a craft she defined despite coming to it late in her career. Exploring the history of the genre, defining its many different forms, and illuminating the stylistic choices that keep a mystery tale running smoothly, Wells provides an invaluable template for writers looking to follow in her footsteps or for readers looking for access to the mind and process of a woman revered in her field. This edition of Carolyn Wells’ The Technique of the Mystery Story is a classic work of American detective fiction reimagined for modern readers.

Since our inception in 2020, Mint Editions has kept sustainability and innovation at the forefront of our mission. Each and every Mint Edition title gets a fresh, professionally typeset manuscript and a dazzling new cover, all while maintaining the integrity of the original book.

With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.

The Philosophy of Composition (1846) is an essay by Edgar Allan Poe. Recognized as a foundational figure of nineteenth century fiction, Poe has inspired generations of readers and writers with his craftsmanship and taste for tragedy and terror. His brief but meteoric career shaped the trajectory of American literature forever, forming a legacy without which science fiction, horror, and detective writing would surely be shells of themselves. Published only three years before his untimely death, the essay appeared in an April 1846 issue of Graham’s American Monthly Magazine of Literature and Art, whose editor had previously made the mistake of turning down “The Raven.” Both influential and controversial, Poe’s essay on craft was intended as a dismissal of the myth of spontaneous art, arguing instead that a true artist depends upon attention to detail and adherence to a logical creative process. Using his own poetic masterpiece as an example, Poe claims that the writer must maintain “unity of effect” throughout the work in order to inspire the intended emotional response in the reader. Once this element has been set in place, the writer may proceed with the more technical aspects of composition, such as characters, setting, and plot. Although Poe’s essay drew the ire of Anglo-American poet T. S. Eliot, it was immensely popular among Poe’s Francophone audience and served as inspiration for such artists as Maurice Ravel and Charles Baudelaire. This edition of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Philosophy of Composition is a classic of American literature reimagined for modern readers.

Since our inception in 2020, Mint Editions has kept sustainability and innovation at the forefront of our mission. Each and every Mint Edition title gets a fresh, professionally typeset manuscript and a dazzling new cover, all while maintaining the integrity of the original book.

With thousands of titles in our collection, we aim to spotlight diverse public domain works to help them find modern audiences. Mint Editions celebrates a breadth of literary works, curated from both canonical and overlooked classics from writers around the globe.