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In The Idea of the Library in the Ancient World Yun Lee Too argues that the ancient library was much more than its incarnation at Alexandria, which has been the focus for students of the subject up till now. In fact, the library is a complex institution with many different forms. It can be a building with books, but it can also be individual people, or the individual books themselves. In antiquity, the library's functions are numerous: as an instrument of power, of memory, of which it has various modes; as an articulation of a political ideal, an art gallery, a place for sociality. Too indirectly raises important conceptual questions about the contemporary library, bringing to these the insights that a study of antiquity can offer.
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The Idea of the Library in the Ancient World YUN LEE TOO
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Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With oYces in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York # Yun Lee Too 2010 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2010 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available Typeset by SPI Publisher Services, Pondicherry, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by MPG Books Group, Bodmin and King’s Lynn ISBN 978–0–19–957780–4 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
For George
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Preface The supposition of this book is that the library, ancient and modern, is a complex and multifarious entity. The sections into which I have divided this book are thus somewhat arbitrary. The part entitled ‘Memories’ contains only one chapter, 6, but memories are also the concern of Chapter 3, which is focused on the walking library; similarly, ‘Origins: The Diachronic Perspective’ contains Chapters 1 and 2, but origins is also a theme of Chapter 4, which is concerned with the book as library. It is impossible to contain exclusively the concerns of each chapter, because topics necessarily overlap with each other. This study is the result of a realization that the ancient library is an interesting topic—I have by no means exhausted it. It took over six years to bring to fruition. I would like to thank Hilary O’Shea, who thought it worthwhile, Ruth Cameron, who got me thinking about metadata, and my two readers at OUP, who made it a much better and more readable book. I would also like to thank Hilary Walford for her meticulous copy-editing.
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Contents Abbreviations
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Introduction: The Idea of the Library