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Printing Press (William Caxton (1500: after his death his assistant…
Printing Press
William Caxton
Merchant
1476: Caxton sets up his press in Westminster
1500: after his death his assistant (Wynkyn de Worde) moved the press to Fleet Street in London
From the court to the city
A new era of printing began
Problems of Caxton:
Usage of foreign words or replace them by native English words?
Which variety of English should he use?
Which literary style? Chaucer or something else?
Spelling and punctuation?
In publishing native writers, should he change their language to make it more widely understood?
Mass communication
Richard Mulcaster
1582: Elementaire
'To find out the right writing of ours'
Fostered standardization in print
17th century
Increasing number of spelling guides
Influenced printing practice
18th century
Notions of correctness emerged
Poor spelling became increasingly stigmatized
Circulation of ideas and views
Criticism on printers
Printers:
Usually foreigners: they introduced native conventions at will and were uncertain of orthographic traditions in English
Proof-reading was not always carried out by educated people, so errors were promulgated
Criticism on the chaotic writing style at the time
Bible
King James Bible - Authorizes Version of the Bible
Never in fact authorized by any parliamentary process
Authorized as in to be read in churches throughout the kingdom
Major influence on the population and language
The aim was to make ONE translation, 'to make a good translation better'
Written in a conservative style
In a dignified style (not popular)
Usage of older forms and constructions of the language
Does not contain a lot of new words (like Shakespeare)
Only about 8,000 words are being used (less than half of Shakespeare's work