The Book History Colloquium at Columbia is pleased to announce the next talk in our series. Robert Darnton, Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor and Director of the Harvard University Library, will be speaking on “Blogging, Now and Then (250 years ago).”

Long before the Internet, Europeans exchanged information in ways that anticipated blogging. The key element of their information system was the “anecdote,” a term that meant nearly the opposite then from what it means today. Anecdotes, dispensed by “libellistes” and “paragraph men,” became a staple in the daily diet of news consumed by readers in eighteenth-century France and England. They were also pilfered, reworked, and served up in books. By tracking anecdotes through texts, we can reassess a rich strain of history and literature.

Please note special time & location.

Tuesday, November 16, 2010
8:00PM
501 Schemerhorn Hall
Map: http://www.columbia.edu/about_columbia/map/schermerhorn.html

This event is free and open to the public.
Co-sponsored by the Friends of the Columbia University Library
Questions? Contact: Gerald Cloud gc2339@columbia.ed