Encountering the Rare Book

Abstract

Excerpt from essay by Andrea Eis: The palpability of book form, as a corporeal container for human thought, is distinctive from the reading of a book. The encounter with a book’s content happens in a reader’s mind; with a tangible book, that encounter is physical as well—it becomes matter for the senses. To hold a book that was printed in 1605, to touch a page that may not have been touched in hundreds of years, is a visceral experience that cannot be replicated in the digital realm.