What was book publishing like in the ancient world? How did authors get their work into the hands of readers? Who were the middlemen?
A search turned up the following links. I have no idea how accurate they are, but they sound reasonable. Here’s one on publishing in the Roman empire. I liked this bit:
Roman emperors were aware of the influence that writers could have and most of them tried to control what was available. Bookshops were often raided and books that were considered to be undesirable would be destroyed. Emperor Augustus even had private houses searched for books that he did not like.
Historians were considered to be particularly dangerous. Emperor Domitian had the historian Hermogenes of Tarsus executed for writing books that he disapproved of. As well as destroying all the books written by Hermogenes, he also killed all the slaves who had done the copying.
Almost reassuring to find out that not much has changed. Alright, we don’t literally kill anyone anymore for disseminating wrongthink, we just cancel or unperson them instead. Progress!
Here’s a good post on publishing in the ancient world that briefly explains how an author became an author:
For publication of these, the steps are as follows:
1. Acquire reputation, such that people wish to hear what you have said
2. Conduct public readings
3. Get copies made by someone, such as a bookdealer
4. Get a patron, and so get a farm – as Martial did in the end
5. Repeat as necessary
If you belonged to literary circles, you could tell your aristocratic friends that you were going to write a history of the last war, of Sulla, or whatever – always avoiding contemporary events where payback might be rather vicious – and then conduct readings – depending on your friends! – and so on.
A poor man probably had limited hope of getting onto the escalator for literary fame. Many obscure poets and authors were starving. Martial mentions many friends who advised him not to bother with poetry, however good he might be, and instead to practice in the lawcourts as a way to earn a living and gain reputation. Patronage was all.
The post ends by recommending Scribes and Scholars: A Guide to the Transmission of Greek and Latin Literature. This post recommends Books and Readers in the Early Church: A History of Early Christian Texts. Both titles sound pretty interesting.
Simon of the Desert
The Many Saints of Suburbia 