Publisher at Work: Yu Xiangdou's Self-Images

Abstract

abstract:The self-images Yu Xiangdou (ca. 1560–1637) inserted in his printed books are often considered portraits of him and thus a proud assertion of his identity as a successful commercial publisher. I analyze his self-images in terms of the highly conventionalized tropes that he appropriated not merely to enhance the market appeal of his imprints but also to prompt readers to visualize his own intellectual labor. By instantiating the otherwise invisible and therefore uncredited intellectual work of publishers, Yu Xiangdou's self-images served as a link between incorporeal authorship and material proprietorship in the increasingly competitive commercial book market of late imperial China.摘要：:余象斗所印書籍中的本人形象並未強調其特殊的個性，而是採用高度格套化的表現形式，是欲增強其印刷品的市場吸引力，亦為促使讀者直觀化其腦力勞動。其畫像在晚期帝國競爭漸盛的商業書市具象化了出版商的腦力勞動，因而連接了物質所有權和無形的著作權。