Journal Article

Declaring, Drafting, and Composing American Independence

Wendorf, Richard

2014

Overview

During the middle decades of the 18th century, the fundamental appearance of texts printed in England underwent a significant change. Books published in London in 1740 were usually printed in \"old style.\" With their employment of heavy capitalization, italics, and small caps, they are still essentially early modern books, their creaking mise-en-pages predicated on an elaborate (if inconsistent) framework of hierarchical differentiation that would not have looked out of place in Cromwell's day. Books published in 1770, on the other hand, were likely to have been printed in the \"new style,\" with a much more restricted use of italics and small caps, and with only the occasional capitalization of words that were not proper nouns. Within 15 years, following the abandonment of the long s and its affiliated ligatures in John Bell's edition of Shakespeare in 1785, most books printed in England began to present modern textual layouts to their readers, essentially providing the kind of encounter with the printed page with which people are familiar today. Here, Wendorf examines the declaration, drafting, and composition of the American Independence.

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press,Bibliographical Society of America
• Subject: 18th century / American history / Capitalization / Committees / Confederation / Congressional committees / Continental congresses / Declaration of Independence-US / Differentiation / Employment / Historical text analysis / Independence / Political debate / Printing / Proper nouns / Typesetting / Word capitalization / Words