Description
Book SynopsisIt was neither the civilization of Renaissance Italy nor the printing press that created the modern world. Instead, it was reading. Through historical analysis and readings of Petrarch, Bruni, Valla, Reuchlin, Erasmus, Foxe and Milton, The Communion of the Book explores how literacy produced modern values, and how digital media threaten those values.
Trade Review“Informed by an immense range of reading, Williams’s work spans periods, countries, and disciplinary fields. His analysis is sharp, incisive, and refreshingly prone to moving in unexpected directions. The prose is assured and elegant, erudite without being pedantic, and enjoyably rewarding for the reader.” Andrea Walkden, University of Toronto and author of Private Lives Made Public: The Invention of Biography in Early Modern England
“I can’t think of anything to compare this book to: it has so much original to say. The Communion of the Book illuminates Milton as a reader and a writer and the influence of humanism in seventeenth-century England. Williams’s research is a monumental synthesis of scholarship in a wide variety of fields, assembled in an original narrative that provides fresh insights.” Sabrina Alcorn Baron, University of Maryland and co-editor of The Politics of Information in Early Modern Europe
"Williams's book should be read, and read carefully, not only by classicists and medieval and Renaissance scholars but also by all who care about modern culture and the present post-reading, postmodern predicament. Essential." Choice
“[A]mbitous and expansive ... Williams's story is a reconsideration of the relation between Renaissance humanism and the Reformation. In his telling, the reading practices developed by humanist intellectuals had profound effects on religious reform, sparking a transition from a sacerdotal religious culture to a literate one – from sacramental to textual forms of participation... The central argument of The Communion of the Book is, indeed, well worth the journey.” Modern Philology
