Book History in the Nordic Countries: Introduction

What characterizes Nordic book history? This was the first thing on our minds when we considered the present special issue of Mémoires du livre – Studies in Book Culture. Setting out on the project and distributing the call for papers we hoped to come up with some sort of answer to our question. However, there is no simple single‑word or single‑sentence answer that encapsulates Nordic book history. On the contrary, several new questions arose: Are there any research topics that are especially common among Nordic book historians? And is there a special Nordic book historical approach when it comes to theory and practice?

Faced with such an array of possible avenues for research, we asked ourselves: what better way to address them than by providing examples of ongoing book historical research in the Nordic countries, as well as examples of research being conducted elsewhere, but dealing with Nordic subjects?

In this wide‑ranging special issue, 16 scholars explore book history from a Nordic perspective, each of them offering a glimpse of their own current research. Taken together, the articles constitute a mosaic of northern book history. They draw from range of different materials, employ several different theories and methods, and explore topics spanning from manuscript culture to audiobooks. Chronologically the articles also cover a wide period, from the early modern era up until today.