Corneille Seghers, Belgian
“My New Printing Press Will Give Even the Basest Commoner Access To Books. Instead of Having To Read Everything on Their Phone,” Between 1837 and 1869
Oil on panel
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The sparse info I found about this artist (first name sometimes spelled Cornelius) can be found here (replicated by several web pages). He currently has no Wikipedia page in any language.
/// Fourteen-fifties— the time was now ripe
for his mass-produced movable type.
Printed pages unfurled
and they changed the whole world.
It seems Gutenberg’s worth all the hype.
/// For example, his Gutenberg Bible
avoids handwritten errors (called “scribal”).
When the text’s in dispute
that can be at the root
of great schisms when zealots get tribal.
/// Of course, books had their critics who’d note
that all students must learn things by rote.
Something he merely read
won’t get etched in his head,
and why memorize what someone wrote?
/// They claimed “Young people’s minds will grow weak
from not parroting words teachers speak.
So-called book-learning’s crazy
and just fit for the lazy.
If this keeps up they’ll stop learning Greek.”