Dr. Alan Galey

• Thu, 03/08/2012 - 7:00pm

2011-2012 DISTINGUISHED SPEAKERS SERIES Dr. ALAN GALEY University of Toronto
 “Ebooks in the Bibliographical Imagination: The Case of The
Sentimentalists and the Giller Prize” In November 2010, Johanna
Skibsrud’s novel The Sentimentalists was announced as the winner of the
Scotiabank Giller Prize, which promptly embroiled the work, its author, and
its publishers in a clash between different modes of book publishing. The
novel’s publication as a limited-run book from a small press (Gaspereau),
then as an ebook (Kobo), then as a mass-market paperback (Douglas &
MacIntyre) sparked public interest in the kinds of questions usually asked by
bibliographers. How do the published versions of The Sentimentalists differ
in their print and digital forms? How do those different forms affect (and
effect) meaning? With the 2010 Giller controversy, the normally specialized
subject matter of textual scholars and digital humanists became matters of
debate in the mainstream media. This talk will explore the role of ebooks in
the bibliographical imagination, using The Sentimentalists as a case study
that demands a synthesis of bibliography, digital humanities, and the history
of the book.