 |
customer@davidpublishing.com |
 |
3275638434 |
 |
 |
| Paper Publishing WeChat |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
LI Qingling, ZHANG Pei
Full-Text PDF
XML 23 Views
DOI:10.17265/2161-623X/2026.09.009
Beijing Institute of Graphic Communication, Beijing, China
In late Qing and early Republican China, lithography reshaped the reproduction of traditional texts by altering book formats and reorganizing knowledge. Through lithographic editions of classics, examination books, fiction, and publishers’ marketing practices, this article shows how lithographic publishing created a dual-track system that preserved authoritative texts while adapting them for practical use and commercial circulation. Photographic reduction and low-cost printing made canonical works portable and expanded access to them through catalogs, advertisements, and distribution networks. Rather than marking a linear shift from elite to popular culture, these publications performed distinct roles in cultural transmission, practical learning, and the market. This history suggests that the revitalization of ancient books and education in this field should integrate textual recognition with edition studies, layout analysis, and the reconstruction of historical contexts of use.
lithographic publishing, examination books, revitalization of ancient books, publishing education
LI Qingling, ZHANG Pei. (2026). Classics and Utility: Knowledge Reorganization Through Lithographic Publishing and Its Educational Implications in Modern China. US-China Education Review A, September 2026, Vol. 16, No. 9, 679-682.
Huang, Q. (2024). Turning stone into gold: The comparative advantages of photolithography and its localization in publishing during the late Qing and early Republican period. Publishing & Printing, 35(4), 103-110.
Pan, J. (2006). Letterpress and lithography and the modern circulation of Ming-Qing popular fiction: Shanghai, 1874-1911. Literary Heritage, 27(6), 96-107.
Shen, J. (2013). The production and circulation of lithographic examination books in the late Qing: Shanghai’s private lithographic publishers, 1880-1905. Journal of Chinese Studies, (57), 245-274.
Shen, J. (2015). The rise and decline of the Tongwen Book Company and its business strategies in the late Qing. Chinese Studies, 33(1), 261-294.
Sun, Y. (2023). A study of woodblock reprints produced through lithography and letterpress in modern China. The Documentation, 45(5), 44-61.
Sun, Y. (2025). Internal and external pressures: Saoye Shanfang amid the transformation of late Qing printing. Modern Publishing, 32(8), 61-70.
Xie, X., & Cheng, M. (2018). Sound beyond the image: The localization of lithographic technology in modern China, 1876-1945. Modern Chinese History Studies, 40(4), 44-64.
Xu, J. (2013). Modernization under a minimum-cost model: A study of Shanghai’s modern lithographic publishing industry, 1878-1956 (Doctoral dissertation, Fudan University, 2013).
Yang, L. (2018). A study of lithography and lithographic books in the late Qing and early Republican period. Shanghai: Shanghai Classics Publishing House.
Yang, Q., & Qin, P. (2022). Book advertisements in Shenbao in the early twentieth century. Journal of Jiangsu Normal University (Philosophy and Social Sciences Edition), 48(4), 51-60.