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Father of the paperback
GAVIN O’TOOLE marvels at the achievement of a Renaissance publisher of popular portable books and the reforming agenda that drove him
Page-spread from the Aristotelis Opera (Works) printed by Aldus Manutius about 1495—1498 [Bayerische Staatsbibliothek/Public domain]

Aldus Manutius: The Invention of the Publisher
Oren Margolis, Reaktion Books, £17.95

IT should be no surprise that an ambitious publisher with a mission, drawn to progressive ideas, was in the vanguard of a cultural revolution in the English-speaking world.

With the launch of Penguin Books in the 1930s and the establishment in Britain of a 20th-century icon, the paperback, Allen Lane revealed both the vast potential of a mass market for fine writing and a hunger for greater access to it among working people.

Lane believed fervently in adult education and was driven by a compulsion to enlighten the masses, and senior editors of Pelican, his non-fiction imprint after 1937, were also involved in the Workers’ Educational Association.

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