Dirk Imhof, Christophe Plantin’s Correspondence: Perspectives on Life and Work as a Publisher in 16th Century Europe (Gent: Academia Press, 2020).
This year the Plantin Moretus Museum of Antwerp is celebrating the 500th anniversary of the birth of the internationally renowned Antwerp publisher and printer Christophe Plantin. What better way to commemorate this important year than republish and examine a selection of his letters and thereby hear directly from Plantin himself.
Of the 1,500 preserved letters, we selected 50 that illustrate various aspects of Plantin’s work and life. They are remarkable, as they provide personal testimony of someone contending with the numerous challenges of managing a business and family concerns in the turbulent end of the sixteenth century in Antwerp. In particular, they reveal how Plantin was continually seeking out means to ensure the survival of his firm, in addition to shedding light on political events in the Low Countries and daily life of the 16th century. For, Plantin also wrote to his friends and to his daughters about his opinions concerning life and religion.
In the new publication Christophe Plantin’s Correspondence. Perspectives on Life and Work as a Publisher in 16th Century Europe, this selection of letters has been translated into modern English and each is accompanied by commentary to clarify the context. The book can be ordered for 40 euros via the museum or the webshop of Academia Press: https://www.lannoopublishers.com/en/christophe-plantins-correspondence?id=745566465.
