Alix Christie - Gutenberg's Apprentice

Forty-eight copies of the Gutenberg Bible still exist, complete or in part, out of the estimated 180 copies made. Some library collections generously cite the makers as “Gutenberg — Schoeffer — Fust?” Most do not. The last time one was auctioned, in 1987, a buyer paid $5.4 million for the Old Testament alone.

This novel could not have been written without the help of experts whose scholarship and advice were crucial to my understanding of early printing. I am particularly indebted to Dr. Lotte Hellinga, former deputy keeper of the British Library, and Paul Needham, director of the Scheide Library at Princeton University, for their unflagging patience with my queries. Dr. Monika Estermann, editor of the Archive of the History of the Book [ Archiv für Geschichte des Buchwesens ] in Frankfurt shared invaluable insights, as did Dr. Wolfgang Dobras, director of the Mainz city archive, and Dr. Stephan Füssel, director of the Mainz Institute for Book Studies [ Mainzer Institut für Buchwissenschaft ] at the Johannes-Gutenberg University. Hearty thanks are also due to the staff of the Mainz Wissenschaftliches Stadtbibliotek and the librarians at the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz.

I have drawn on the painstaking research of eminent Gutenberg scholars over half a millennium, although the interpretation of the facts is my own. I relied heavily on Guy Bechtel’s magisterial 1992 study, Gutenberg: Une Enquete, and the art historical insights of Dr. Eberhard König, among others. A bibliography of sources and images can be found at www.gutenbergsapprentice.com.

For most of my life, I have been inspired by formidable masters of the typographic arts. I was fortunate to apprentice as a letterpress printer under the foreman of the former Mackenzie & Harris hot type foundry in San Francisco, the late Lester Lloyd, and to the proprietors of the Yolla Bolly Press in Covelo, California, the late James Robertson and Carolyn Robertson. This book is dedicated to those master printers, who left an indelible impression on me and led me directly to Johann Gutenberg and Peter Schoeffer. Peggy Gotthold and Lawrence Van Velzer of Foolscap Press offered support at every step, along with hand-printed materials for special editions of the novel. Close readers Vonnie Madigan, Katherine Maxfield, and the North London Writers Group contributed enormously, and I have been blessed with exceptional editors in Terry Karten and Marion Donaldson and fantastic agents in Simon Trewin, Dorian Karchmar, and Annemarie Blumenhagen. My mother, sister, and brothers championed this book from the start, but it is my husband and children I owe the deepest thanks, for their love and forbearance during my long trek through the medieval world. Vivat biblus .

ALIX CHRISTIEis an author, journalist, and letterpress printer. She apprenticed to two master California printers and owns and operates a 191 °Chandler & Price letterpress. A widely published journalist, she turned to fiction in the 1990s, studying at St. Mary’s College of California, where she earned a masters of fine arts. She lives in London with her husband and two children. Gutenberg’s Apprentice is her first novel.

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The title and text of this book are set in Historical Fell Type, a digital revival of one of the oldest book faces cut in England. It was designed by Peter de Walpergen, a Dutch punch-cutter, in the late seventeenth century for John Fell, the bishop of Oxford, and was one of the founding typefaces of the Oxford University Press. The initial capitals in main chapters are Linotype “Like Gutenberg Caps” from the Monotype company. The floriated initials in Sponheim Abbey chapters are facsimiles of illuminated initials in the Yale University Library copy of Johann Gutenberg’s last work, the Catholicon of Balbus.