"Humanists with Inky Fingers" by Anthony Grafton

Leo S. Olschki, Florence, has just published the 2010 Annual Balzan Lecture "Humanists with Inky Fingers. The Culture of Correction in Renaissance Europe", given by Anthony Grafton, 2002 Balzan Prizewinner for the History of the Humanities, at ETH Zurich on 10 December 2010.
Printed in English, it is available from the Olschki retail network (http://www.olschki.it/page.htm, 86 Pages, 15 Euro).
 
This is the second volume in the series the Annual Balzan Lectures, which are held on alternate years in Italy and Switzerland, on the basis of the Agreements of collaboration signed by the International Balzan Foundation “Prize” with the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences and the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei to promote the diffusion of cutting edge research in the sciences and humanities.

Anthony Grafton focuses on the correction of texts in the «Republic of Letters» of the 16th and 17th centuries. He explains how such activity was often the preserve of the best minds of the era. He illustrates how, in addition to simply working up the texts for printing, censorship was exercised with both a light and heavy hand and how emendations both intended and unintended, affected the reception of the texts.