Seventeenth Century Print Culture

Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss 17th century print culture.”Away ungodly Vulgars, far away, Fly ye profane, that dare not view the day, Nor speak to men but shadows, nor would hear Of any news, but what seditious were, Hateful and harmful and ever to the best, Whispering their scandals … “ In 1614 the poet and playwright George Chapman poured scorn on the popular appetite for printed news. However, his initial scorn did not stop him from turning his pen to satisfy the public’s new found appetite for scandal. From the advent of the printing press the number of books printed each year steadily increased, and so did literacy rates. With a growing and socially diverse readership appearing over the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, printed texts reflected controversy in every area of politics, society and religion. In the advent of the Civil War, print was used as the ideological battleground by the competing forces of Crown and Parliament. What sorts of printed texts were being produced? How widespread was literacy and who were the new consumers of print? Did print affect social change? And what role did print play in the momentous English Civil War?

→ Play on BBC Sounds website

Guests

• Kevin Sharpe 2 episodes
  Professor of Renaissance Studies at Queen Mary, University of London
• Ann Hughes 2 episodes
  Professor of Early Modern History at the University of Keele
• Joad Raymond No other episodes
  Professor of English Literature at the University of East Anglia

Related episodes

• Caxton and the Printing Press
  
  18 Oct, 2012 680 Manufacture for specific uses
• Reading
  
  17 Feb, 2000 020 Library and information sciences
• Episode 2
  
  3 Jan, 2012 000 Computer science, knowledge and systems
• Literature
  
  5 Jan, 2012 800 Literature, rhetoric and criticism
• The Book of Common Prayer
  
  17 Oct, 2013 200 Religion
• The Scriblerus Club
  
  9 Jun, 2005 800 Literature, rhetoric and criticism
• Episode 3
  
  4 Jan, 2012 200 Religion
• Epistolary Literature
  
  15 Mar, 2007 820 English and Old English literatures
• Episode 5
  
  6 Jan, 2012 500 Science
• Modern Culture
  
  21 Jan, 1999 800 Literature, rhetoric and criticism
• The Thirty Years War
  
  6 Dec, 2018 940 History of Europe
• Dickens
  
  12 Jul, 2001 820 English and Old English literatures
• Electrickery
  
  4 Nov, 2004 500 Science
• Episode 1
  
  2 Jan, 2012 410 Linguistics
• Sensation
  
  6 Nov, 2003 820 English and Old English literatures
• Pope
  
  9 Nov, 2006 820 English and Old English literatures
• The Putney Debates
  
  18 Apr, 2013 320 Political science
• Politeness
  
  30 Sep, 2004 390 Customs, etiquette and folklore
• The Trial of Charles I
  
  4 Jun, 2009 940 History of Europe
• Consequences of the Industrial Revolution
  
  30 Dec, 2010 330 Economics

---

Programme ID: p003hycj

Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/p003hycj

Auto-category: 002.09 (History of printing and literature in the 17th century)