ABSTRACT
T he Sacred Books of the East was the first series of books from the Press which was to have an impact on India, although not immediately and not in the way the editors envisaged. It was followed by the Rulers of India, and between these two series we can see the beginning of the transition from antiquarian Orientalism subsidized by the state (although this survived alongside the new approach for some time) to a more commercial publishing programme independent of patronage. Physically also, the huge tomes of the Sacred Books had little resemblance to the slim volumes of the Rulers, except for their trademark Oxford Blue covers. Even in 1910, when the last and fiftieth volume (the Index) was being published, the Sacred Books were primarily prestige purchases. For instance, when Cannan asked Milford whether the books were to be cut (that is if the edges were to be trimmed as in modern books, or left with the folds on so that readers could cut them open with a paper knife), Milford responded that they were not, because, ‘we weighed
the anguish of scholars in the balance with that of book collectors, and the scholars’ anguish kicked the beam (I like cutting thick-papered books)’.2 In both physical form and editorial policy, the Sacred Books of the East catered more for the antiquarian book market than to serious scholarship. By 1910 the uncut book was an antiquarian throwback; the publisher’s case (the mass-produced cloth-covered board folder into which the book is sewn) had been in use for several decades, and most hardback books were sold cut and bound with a dust jacket just as they are today. But the Press’s antique binding methods were not part of a William Morris-inspired Kelmscott Press-type aestheticism; the Press felt no need to return to tradition because it had never left it.3 Consequently neither cheapness nor utility were built into the Sacred Books’ design.
