bibliopoly
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˌbɪbliˈɒpəli/
ipa: /ˌbɪbliˈɑpəli/
Etymology: From bibliopole (“bookseller”) + -poly (suffix denoting sellers in a market). Bibliopole is derived from Latin bibliopōla (“bookseller”), from Ancient Greek βῐβλῐοπώλης (bĭblĭopṓlēs, “bookseller”), from βῐβλῐ́ον (bĭblĭ́on), βυβλίον (bublíon, “book; letter; tablet; strip of papyrus; writing”) (from βῠ́βλος (bŭ́blos, “papyrus plant; writings on papyrus; book”), from Βῠ́βλος (Bŭ́blos, “city of Byblos”), a source of papyrus) + -πώλης (-pṓlēs, suffix denoting a retailer, shop owner, etc.) (from πωλέω (pōléō, “to sell”)). The English word is also analysable as biblio- (prefix meaning ‘book’) + -poly.
Senses: examples: text: If the ſecretary to the French bibliopoly tranſlates the tragedy of Henry V. faithfully, as he has promiſed, he vvill open a fine ſchool of delicacy and decorum for the inſtruction of our courtiers.
ref: 1776, Voltaire, “[The Appendix to the Fourth Volume of the London Review.] Lettre de M. de Voltaire à l’Academie Francoise, &c. Or, A Letter from M. de Voltaire, to the French Academy, Read at Their Last Public Assembly on the Festival of St. Louis, August 23, 1776.”, in [anonymous], transl., edited by W[illiam] Kenrick, The London Review of English and Foreign Literature, volume IV, London: […] T[homas] Evans, […], →OCLC, page 511:
text: Instead of attempting to translate the terms of Roman bibliopoly, many of which are ill-understood, and all of which would sound harsh in English poetry, I have, in common I believe with all translators, described his writings as in a modern book.
ref: 1821, George Lamb, “Notes to Vol. I”, in Caius Valerius Catullus, translated by George Lamb, The Poems of Caius Valerius Catullus Translated. […], volume I, London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 145:
text: Nature, however, has been kind, and bibliopoly thrives.
ref: 1828 January 1, M., “A First Lesson in Reading”, in The New Monthly Magazine and Literary Journal, volume XXII, part I, number LXXXV, London: Henry Colburn […], →OCLC, page 360:
text: We have heard similar complaints (at least as far as the book trade is concerned) from the highest quarters of bibliopoly.
ref: 1831 August, O. Y., “An Apology for a Preface to Our Fourth Volume”, in Fraser’s Magazine for Town and Country, volume IV, number XIX, London: James Fraser […], →OCLC, footnote *, page 4:
text: Great as was the success—and its sale was almost unprecedented in the annals of Russian bibliopoly, the career of the "Polar Star" was exceedingly brief, as it did not extend beyond its third volume.
ref: 1836, “Art. IX.—Poliarnya Zvœsdà; Severnie Tzvœti; Nevsky Almanakh, &c. &c. The Polar Star; Northern Flowers; Neva Almanack, &c. &c.—Russian Annuals and Literary Pocket Books.”, in The Foreign Quarterly Review, volume XVI, number XXXII, London: Adolphus Richter & Co. (late Treuttel and Wurtz, and Richter,) […]); Black and Armstrong, […], →OCLC, page 446:
text: There are as good fish in that buccaneering sea of Bibliopoly as ever were caught, and if one of them have broken away from your harpoon, I hope the net may prove a downright Kraken on whom, if needful, you can pitch your tent and live.
ref: 1853 December 5, Bliss Perry, quoting James Russell Lowell, “The Editor who was Never the Editor”, in The Atlantic Monthly: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics, volume C, number 5, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company […], published November 1907, →OCLC, page 664, column 2:
text: Bibliopoly, bibliopoesy, in all their branches, are sick, sick, hastening to death and new genesis.
ref: 1882, James Anthony Froude, “A.D. 1832. Æt. 37.”, in Thomas Carlyle: A History of the First Forty Years of His Life, 1795–1835 […], volume II, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., →OCLC, page 310:
text: Although [Ralph Waldo] Emerson initiated the correspondence, [Thomas] Carlyle was to gain much from this friendship in the next decade as Emerson was to perform many services for the Scotsman, […] performing much bibliopoly for Carlyle in the next few years.
ref: 1971, Jules Paul Seigel, “Ralph Waldo Emerson, an Unsigned Review, Dial: July 1843, iv, 96–102”, in Jules Paul Seigel, editor, Thomas Carlyle (The Critical Heritage), Abingdon, Oxfordshire; New York, N.Y.: Routledge, published 1995, →ISBN, page 219:
text: The three parts were sufficiently self-contained to warrant consideration as individual monographs, and such has been the shape of their transposition to Anglo-American vernacular and bibliopoly.
ref: 1986, Jaan Puhvel, David Weeks, “Editors’ Preface”, in Georges Dumézil, edited by Jaan Puhvel and David Weeks, The Plight of a Sorcerer, Berkeley; Los Angeles, Calif.; London: University of California Press, →ISBN, page vii:
text: The evolution of political and social structures and concomitant systems of education certainly plays a role here, as do the technology of printing, the growth of lending libraries and other book-circulating associations, the serialization of otherwise unwieldy and unaffordable books, and the gradual advent of indiscriminate mass bibliopoly, all of which produce a situation where in principle anyone, for a reasonable sum of money, can become a reader of anything.
ref: 2008, Benjamin Bennett, “Reading, and the Theory of Reading”, in The Dark Side of Literacy: Literature and Learning Not to Read, New York, N.Y.: Fordham University Press, →ISBN, page 28:
synonyms: word: bibliopolism
word: bibliopolery
glosses: Bookselling.
Related terms: word: bibliopolar
word: bibliopole
word: bibliopolery
word: bibliopolic
word: bibliopolical
word: bibliopolically
word: bibliopolism
word: bibliopolist
word: bibliopolistic