1 - Book Practices & Textual Itineraries - 1 / 2011

The essays in this volume draw upon recent debates in the fields of textual scholarship and book history to argue for a more flexible understanding of what constitutes a literary work. Each contributor, while working from different perspectives, draws attention to the impossibility of establishing any clearly delineated space within which such works can be said to exist. All of the essays engage with cases that challenge our assumptions about how literary works should be defined, be it through re-edition in varying forms, in varying contexts, with varying paratextual features; through character migration between texts, and even between media; or through the presence of multiple authorised versions. The title of the volume, 'Tracing the Contours of Literary Works', acknowledges the continuing relevance of distinctions between literary and non-literary works while simultaneously drawing attention to the care that critics must exercise in defining the objects of his or her study. It suggests that the outlines we trace around the space 'belonging' to any given literary work must always be provisional, fluid, perhaps multiple, since no work can be reduced to a single, authoritative textual state.

Book Practices & Textual Itineraries is a series of peer-reviewed book-length publications devoted to the study of book history and textual scholarship. It traces evolutions in the production, transmission and reception of books and texts over time and across cultural and disciplinary boundaries. It likewise examines new practices that are developing in response to the acceleration of textual production and exchange provoked by electronic media, and considers their significance for the editing and interpretation of literary works. Published at Nancy-Université, with an international editorial advisory board, the series aims to facilitate dialogue on book history and textual scholarship between scholars from France, Europe and the English-speaking world.