Edited by = Herausgegeben von Eva Hanebutt-Benz · Dagmar Glaß · Geoffrey Roper, in collaboration with = unter Mitarbeit von Theo Smets / Gutenberg Museum Mainz, Internationale Gutenberg-Gesellschaft. Westhofen: WVA-Verlag Skulima, 2002. XXIV, 555 pp. Numerous colour & monochrome illustrations.
ISBN: 3-936136-02-5
Book:
Middle Eastern languages and the print revolution: a cross-cultural encounter.
A catalogue and companion to the Exhibition = Sprachen des Nahen Ostens und die Druckrevolution: eine interkulturelle Begegnung. Katalog und Begleitband zur Ausstellung.
Originally produced to accompany the ground-breaking exhibition in the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz in 2002, this is a lavishly illustrated catalogue of around 90 carefully chosen historic and rare printed items in Arabic, Persian, Turkish and other Middle Eastern languages. As well as detailed descriptions of the exhibits, there are 15 essays, written by experts, on historical, cultural and technical aspects of the printing of texts in Arabic and other scripts over the last 1000 years.
This was the last book designed and produced by the late Theo Smets, a German master typographer specialising in the scholarly use of non-European scripts.
