“Odious! In Woollen!”: Blank Precedents and the London Stationers, 1690-1830

Twenty-First Kenneth Karmiole Lecture on the History of the Book Trade

Lecture by Dennis Duncan, Associate Professor, University College London

This paper begins with a collection of four dozen Burying in Woollen affidavits from the village of Upper Heyford in Oxfordshire, dating from the first decade of the eighteenth century to the last. Each affidavit testifies to a burial in the village, and an oath taken by a relative of the deceased that the body was wrapped in nothing other than wool. These are roughly-printed, single-sheet forms, illustrated with crude woodcuts of skulls and cadavers. They were printed seventy miles away in London.

What can the stationery of a country rector tell us about the practices of the London printers, how they advertised, and how the blank precedentꟷwhat we might today call a formꟷoffered rich, ever-changing opportunities to supplement their book work?

Dennis Duncan is a writer and Associate Professor in English at University College London. His books include Book Parts (with Adam Smyth, Oxford University Press, 2019), and Index, A History of the (W. W. Norton, 2022). The latter was a New York Times bestseller and was listed as one of the Books of the Year in the New York Times, TIME magazine, the Washington Post, and the Financial Times. It has been translated into nine languages. He writes regularly for the New York Times, the London Review of Books, the Guardian, and the Times Literary Supplement. His current research concerns ephemera and the history of collecting. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

The registration form will post here approximately one month in advance of the program. This event is free to attend with advance registration and will be held in-person at the Clark Library. Seating is limited. Walk-in registrants are welcome as space permits. The registration form will be posted here approximately one month in advance of the program.

The lecture will be livestreamed and the recording will be available to watch on the Center’s YouTube channel for one year following the event. Registration is not required to watch the livestream.

Image: Jacob Giles, The Modern Justice (London: J. Tonson, 1720), p. 90 [Clark Library Rare Book Stacks; K J15mo 1720].