Drawing on Daniel Defoe’s Essay upon Literature, the introduction defines the term ‘hand’ in relation to manual writing. It outlines how Defoe understands the ‘work of writing’ in relation both to manual writing and engraving, and emphasizes the importance of the rolling press to reproductions of script in print. The introduction continues by discussing how the term ‘work of writing’ appears in theory and contemporary scholarship. Referring both to eighteenth-century writing masters and to contemporary philosophy, and their shared recognition of writing’s materiality, the introduction disputes notions of the eighteenth century as a ‘logocentric’ period. The introduction concludes by outlining the arguments of the chapters to follow.
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