If later technology had been available to the pioneers of the book making field the result wouldn’t be good. So much of the value in old Books is the artistry required in their production. Some of the pre-incunabula work we looked at was absolutely breathtaking because someone had taken the time and the effort to hand write it. Think for a moment about how much effort it takes to hand write several pages and then magnify that by the length of some of the works, the artistry in the lettering and the artistry on the pages themselves. How much value would these early works have had if they were printed with a Gutenberg press, or even a modern inkjet printer?

With the technology available to us now the value in the work has shifted, the artistry of the book is not valued but the artistry of the language on the page. In many ways the technology of the printing press and subsequent variations of the printing press have shifted the value of the work to the author and their craft. Is this not better for language and writers now that their work is not being overshadowed by the book it is contained in? In some ways this is a conundrum, the Author and their true meaning behind the words they have painstakingly crafted are the focal point. But if the reverse is true and printing technology remained in the pre-press era the artistic value of the books decreases and the  written word becomes secondary. Therefore, the best outcome is somewhere in the middle of the technological growth of printing, when written word and artistry meet in the middle.