The session in the Library on Tuesday, February 5th helped to establish a real connection with the first two chapters of Nicole Howard’s The Book. This was not my first time viewing such forms of print, as I have seen pictures of them in the past. However, seeing these works in person allowed me to truly notice and appreciate all the intricate details. What was particularly eye-opening for me was seeing the actual print itself. In the Howard reading, she mentioned how an effort was made to make the printed text appear as if it was handwritten, rather than done by machine. I had a hard time picturing this, but seeing the real life examples clearly explained this. The words in the manuscripts had nowhere near the boldness or clarity of text seen in modern books. It truly did appear to look like work an ancient scribe could have done. Another notable feature was the amount of work that went into producing the various intricate details of the pages, such as the colorization of the capital letters. Seeing this reminded me of the evolution that books have undergone over the years. While the goal in modern book production is to cheaply distribute as many copies as possible, people in earlier times saw the creation of these works as a much more intricate art process.