Rags Make Paper, Paper Makes Money: Material Texts and Metaphors of Capital

Senchyne, Jonathan

doi:10.1353/tech.2017.0047

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Paper is everywhere. It is so pervasive as to be invisible, although recent work by Lisa Gitelman (), Jonathan Senchyne (, ) and Richard Taws () has been particularly influential in bringing it to the attention of media theorists. Book history, however, which focuses on the processes of making and distributing (Darnton, ), seems largely uninterested in paper, except as it is folded and printed upon.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paper and the poor: Romantic media ecologies and the Bank Restriction Act of 1797

Brylowe

2019

Literature Compass

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Rag paper is a common denominator for many Romantic‐era medial forms. The term “media ecology” has become increasingly accepted in media theory, and its spatial and ecological affinities connect it to the urgent topic of climate change. Media ecology invites book historians to consider the labor as well as the origins of the materials that underwrite our culture. This consideration of paper recasts the literary archive as an accretion of physical as well as intellectual labor. The physical labor necessary for the making of rag paper included increasingly industrialized agricultural work and textile production, as well as rag collecting and sorting, as many period authors were aware. At the inception of the Bank Restriction Period (1797–1821), the introduction of low‐denomination paper banknotes changed the London media ecology in ways that had a devastating effect on the English poor, including the very orders of agricultural and textiles workers, rag collectors, and papermill rag‐room women who had a hand in paper making. The Bank of England investigated and prosecuted hundreds, resulting in poverty, transportation, imprisonment, and executions. Paper notes and their forgeries invited considerations of other forms of cultural value and circulation, including literary authorship, and the article ends with the Bank of England's current celebration of Jane Austen as a literary icon by including her portrait on the polymer £10 note.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Paper and the poor: Romantic media ecologies and the Bank Restriction Act of 1797

Brylowe

2019

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Networked Industry Survival

Ehrich

2024

Palgrave Studies in Economic History

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This chapter introduces the reader to the deeply entrenched relation of capitalist networks and the Dutch paper industry. The production of paper from rags—old and torn cloth—already existed in pre-industrial seventeenth-century Netherlands and continued well into the nineteenth century. Initially, the chapter conducts an international comparison of this well-established industry before delving into a more detailed exploration of the four dimensions of networks in capitalism: technology, state-industry relations, competition and cooperation, and labor-capital relations. The chapter concludes by outlining the methodology used to historicize the industry across four phases of capitalism: the rise of Dutch capitalism (1580–1815), Dutch monarchic liberalism (1815–1914), Fordism (1914–1980), and post-Fordism (1980 until now).

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Jane Austen on Paper

Burgess

2018

European Romantic Review

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Rags Make Paper, Paper Makes Money: Material Texts and Metaphors of Capital

Cited by 5 publications

References 10 publications

Paper and the poor: Romantic media ecologies and the Bank Restriction Act of 1797

Paper and the poor: Romantic media ecologies and the Bank Restriction Act of 1797

Networked Industry Survival

Jane Austen on Paper

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