Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2000

Publication Title

The British Journal for the History of Science

Volume

33

Issue

2

First Page

187

Last Page

207

Abstract

The theory, method and disciplinary foundations of ‘book history’ are addressed in the context of a close examination of the International Scientific Series, a set of monographs that appeared from 1871 to 1911 in Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia and the United States. Working closely with entrepreneurial publishers, most authors of ISS volumes were scientific professionals (T. H. Huxley, John Tyndall, Herbert Spencer and E. L. Youmans were among the founders) aiming to educate a broad popular audience. Commercial, scholarly and other pressures made the texts less fixed than they appear: revisions, appendices and other evidences of textual instability have been overlooked by previous commentators.

Comments

This article was originally published in The British Journal for the History of Science (http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0007087499003945). Copyright Cambridge University Press.

Included in

History Commons

Share

COinS