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<p>The idea of “the
book” overflows with extraneous significance: books are presented as windows,
gateways, vessels, lighthouses, and gardens. Books speak to us and feed us, and
they are a method of escape. The book has long represented much more than a
static, hinged, bound, covered object inscribed with words. Even when a book is
not performing an elaborate, imaginative function, the word “book” very often
signifies the text it holds or even the text’s author: You can open <i>The Bluest Eye</i> or carry Toni Morrison in
your bag. Fourteenth-century author Geoffrey Chaucer invokes a “book” by
“Lollius” as authoritative source of his<i>
Troilus and Criseyde</i>, though no person exists; likewise, to conclude the
same text, Chaucer asks directs his project to “go, litel bok, go.” When a book
makes an appearance in narrative, it is rarely j<i>ust a book</i>—without legs, the book moves, and without breath, it
lives. This dissertation asks what about the shape of the codex has helped the
book become such a metaphorically rich signifier.<br></p>
<p>This
dissertation attempts to unravel the various threads of meaning that make up
the complex “idea of the book.” I focus on one of these threads: the book as a
material object. By focusing on how the book as object—not the book as
idea—functions within narrative, I argue that we can identify what about the
book object enables its metaphorical range. I analyze moments in literature,
television, and film when metaphorical functions are assigned, not to an
ephemeral, complex idea of the book, but rather to the material realities of
the book as an object. In these moments, the codex’s essential, material shape
(what I am calling its bookishness) enables metaphorical functioning; I show
that, by examining when mundanely physical bindings, pages, covers, and spines
initiate metaphorical action, we can identify how the material book has come to
mean so much more than itself.</p>
<p><a></a>Indeed, despite a renewed appreciation for the
book as both material and cultural object, books have become so significantly
meaningful that attempts to define “the book” evade simplicity, rendering books
as everything and nothing at the same time. My inquire explores this complexity
by starting with a simple premise: Metaphors are based on some element of
physical truth. Though the book has sprouted in a variety of metaphorical
directions, many of those metaphors are grounded in the book’s material realities.
Acknowledging this, especially in an age of fast-evolving media and bookish
fetishism, offers a valuable and novel perspective on how and why books are
both semantically rich and culturally valued objects.</p>
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| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:purdue.edu/oai:figshare.com:article/15057483 |
| Date | 29 July 2021 |
| Creators | Christina M McCarter (11186181) |
| Source Sets | Purdue University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis |
| Rights | CC BY 4.0 |
| Relation | https://figshare.com/articles/thesis/HINGED_BOUND_COVERED_THE_SIGNIFYING_POTENTIAL_OF_THE_MATERIAL_CODEX/15057483 |
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