Project gutenberg was started in 1971 by michael hart at the university of illinois with the aim of establishing an electronic public library of 10 000 books. Sales of trade and mass market paperbacks exceeded 3 billion.

Book Wikipedia

When were books invented.

When were books invented. China s first recognizable books called jiance or jiandu were made of rolls of thin split and dried bamboo bound together with hemp silk or leather. The first paper books were printed using the. Sheets of papyrus were glued together to form long rolls.

The first ever book to be printed was the diamond sutra in 866. It was not until the very late 18th century that these techniques were applied to books designed for entertainment particularly for children. The publication of the modern paperback began in 1935 with the publication of the first ten penguin books.

The nearest thing to them were rolls of papyrus. The book covers were made of wood and covered with leather. These paper bound volumes were offered for sale at a fraction of the historic cost of a book and were of a smaller format 110 mm 178 mm 4 3 8 in 7 in aimed at the railway traveller.

It was a woodblock printed paper book. Paperback books provided a source of good quality writing and literature but at a lesser cost than traditional hard bound books. Before the introduction of books writing on bone shells wood and silk was prevalent in china long before the 2nd century bc until paper was invented in china around the 1st century ad.

The ethos of the project. During the later middle ages when public libraries appeared up to the 18th century books were often chained to a bookshelf or a desk to prevent theft. Some of the first three dimensional and tab activated books were produced by ernest nister and lothar meggendorfer.

These books were popular in germany and britain during the 19th century. Books as we know them didn t appear until the middle ages. Because dried parchment tends to assume the form it had before processing the books were fitted with clasps or straps.

The routledge s railway library series of paperbacks remained in print until 1898 and offered the traveling public 1 277 unique titles.