Patents, Pictures and Patronage by Elizabeth Evenden

CITATION: Evenden, Elizabeth. Patents, Pictures and Patronage: John Day and the Tudor Book Trade. Aldershot, Hampshire, England: Ashgate, 2008. Print.
Understanding

• Question: How did the presentation of Day's most famous books result in his reputation as master of the trade?
• Answer: Day "saw the necessity of patronage in the Church and at court in securing the patents and... the crucial importance of patronage by proving himself the best man for the job... by proving his technical mastery of the trade... [b]y creating visually impressive books..." (178)
• Method: Evenden explains Day's business acumen through his patents, bookshops, and advertisements, and describes his courtly politicking in terms of religious conflict and prestigious illustration.
• Assumptions: Evenden has mixed assumptions about the status and format of illustrated books. She claims on 69-70 that A&M "created yet another prized monopoly" by "putting an end to what could otherwise have been an open market for printers of smaller, ephemeral martyrological works."
  But on 103, she argues that Day might hypothetically "produce pamphlets made up of various woodcuts in order to maximise the range of customers and so increase his income, as one might expect a printer to do, in order to ensure a healthy profit." There are a few discrepancies between these two accounts:
  (a) the profitability of pamphlets for Day relative to a "monopoly" on A&M, and
  (b) the role of A&M--passive or deliberate--in preventing a market for martyrological formats.
  It's unclear whether Evenden believes that early modern consumers treated large folios and pamphlets as comparable, or the degree to which Evenden believes Day was subject to the profit motive. 
• Sententiae: "Day borrowed woodcuts from Grafton on a number of occasions, particularly since Grafton, the King's Printer, owned a stock of elaborate woodcuts that emphasized the monarchical imperialism and the central position of the monarchy within the Reformation." (11)
  "... Day's connection to Stamford has appeared tenuous; especially since the only evidence, hitherto known of his printing De vera obedientia in Stamford rests upon this single comment by Foxe which, moreover, only appeared in the first edition and was never reprinted.
  "Day was [sic] in Lincolnshire at some point during the period 1553-54, for during that time he rented two acres in the village of Barholm, on land owned by William Cecil...
  "There is also typographical evidence to prove that the Michael Wood texts were printed by John Day. The roman type found in these tracts also occurs in Day's edition of John Ponet's A short catechisme from early 1553 and also in Sir Thomas Elyot's The Banket of Sapience from 1557...
  "Nevertheless no works appear bearing the Michael Wood imprint after May [1554], and even if De vera obedientia was printed in early June, it seems that the Michael Wood press remained inactive through that summer and early autumn. Why? It is likely that Day had run out of paper." (32-35)
  "Day's and Cecil's attempt to house an illicit press in England, while bold and not bereft of concrete results, nevertheless was doomed to failure." (46)
  "[Day's] production of Foxe's huge work effectively smothered any potential English competition, putting an end to what could otherwise have been an open market for printers of smaller, ephemeral martyrological works." (69)
  "It was only a matter of time before Day's demand outstripped supply... In July 1566 John Foxe made a request to Cecil that the law limiting the number of foreign workmen allowed to work for a printer to four be lifted for Day." (96)
  "Nor did [Day] simply produce pamphlets made up of various woodcuts in order to maximise the range of customers and so increase his income, as one might expect a printer to do, in order to ensure healthy profit." (103)
  "The removal of [John Day's] stock [by Richard Day and Henry Bynneman], however, became blatantly obvious when one of John Day's most notorious woodcuts, the initial C, which depicted him alongside William Cecil and John Foxe in attendance of the queen, was used in a book printed by Bynneman." (163)

Overstanding

• Assessment: Clearly I'm smitten with Evenden. She has a special talent at stringing together narratives that are both clear and revealing regarding Day, his relationship to Cecil, and to early modern print. I have nothing but praise for this eminently readable book.
• Synthesis: Naturally Evenden leans heavily on her shared research as part of Evenden & Freeman. But furthermore, Evenden offers a surprising response to Collinson's argument in an essay I have yet to read--one in King and Highley's John Foxe in His World.
• Application: Evenden presents an ambivalent pair of views, noted in "Assumptions," regarding the profit motive and status. My hypothesis is that Day refrained from re-packaging A&M for pamphlets because he wanted to preserve the status of the folio. That is, I believe, commensurate with profit-maximizing motives. Yet I struggle to imagine a test suitable to the hypothesis: there were so few contemporaneous printers as successful and prestigious as Day that it's hard to tell how an alternative strategy would have done.
  Also, Evenden repeatedly remarks on Day's replenishment-rate of paper, which leads me to wonder whether there's an absolute "speed of paper" for all non-royal stationers. If so, it's tantalizing to imagine that early modern English print can be expressed by a definite production frontier, fixed by the fixity of paper.