ABSTRACT
Students of English literature face a demanding programme of study in a discipline which has developed dynamically even as teachers and institutions of education have grappled with social and economic changes and financial constraints. A common feature of both the new theoretical approaches in literary criticism and of the 'new bibliography' characterized as the sociology of the text is their stress on contingency. Transformations of meaning are effected by the very matter from which the book is constituted; differences in paper, format, typefaces, page layout, illustrations and bindings can make the same text mean differently. The materials which embody the text are made and supplied by several different specialists and the text may pass through many hands on its way from author to printed form: those of scribe or copyist, amanuensis, secretary, typist, editor, translator, compositor, printer, proofreader and publisher.
