Originally, books were written by hand. The writing was done on silk in China, on palm leaves in India, on papyrus in Egypt. If anyone wanted to possess a copy of any book, he had to engage an expert to copy it out for him. As learning was confined to a small section of the people—to the Brhahmins in ancient India, to the priests in Mediaeval Europe—the need for books was easily satisfied.
Printing arose in China. Among the Buddhists, there was a great demand for reproduction of prayers in increasing numbers. In Europe, according to Dr. Bernal, the demand for playing cards gave rise to large-scale block printing. Later on, this was used for printing prayers and sacred images.
The discovery of methods of manufacturing paper was a powerful impetus to the invention of printing. Naturally, the cost of handwritten books became prohibitive. That was why attention was directed in Europe to the invention of printing and to improvement in its methods.
The Chinese used movable wooden types; the Koreans are said to have been the first to invent metal types—in the fourteenth century. The Europeans adopted this method of printing in the fifteenth century, and Caxton was pioneer in this regard. In India, the Christian missionaries, notably William Cary of Serampore, founded the first printing press in the later part of the eighteenth century. One Panchanan Karmakar was the first to make movable types in Bengali.
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The chief factor responsible for the increasing use of printing in the fifteenth century and for the perfecting of the mechanical process was the great revival of learning that took place, and also the religious reform movements. They first created a demand for books, principally literature and poetry, in the various ‘schools’ at the newly founded Universities in the different countries of Europe.
Secondly- they created a great demand for reading the Bible in vernacular translations. The religious controversies also led to a multiplication of religious tracts. As knowledge, increased books on philosophy and science also grew in number. That is how the art of printing made rapid development.
Printing books in a modern press is a highly technical affair. It has two branches— composing and then printing. Setting and composing. When mechanical methods came into use, these types reached great perfection.
Two methods are usually in vogue in a big press,—the linotype, which produces each as a complete unit, and the monotype, which produces single type to be assembled in lines. But the old method of setting types by hand is still used for complicated printing. After types are properly composed, they are ready to be set in the printing press for printing impressions according to the number needed. Three different types of machinery are used for printing, the platen, the cylindrical, and the rotary.
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The hand press has been superseded by these mechanised processes. A hand-press can, at most print two hundred and fifty copies an hour. But a modern printing machine can easily print off hundreds of thousands copies per hour.
The art of printing has completely revolutionized the world of scholarship. It has helped the spread of literacy. It has created a demand for knowledge. It has thrown open the knowledge to the people as a whole. Learning has ceased to be a class distinction. The democracy of letters is ever on the increase.
Finally, it has brought the trades, the arts, and the learned professions for the first time into close relationship; the aristocracy of blood has been replaced by the aristocracy of culture, which is open to all. Without the printing press, the phenomenal progress of the modern world would have been impossible. That knowledge, like peace, is indivisible has been brought home to use by the printing press. Any new idea can propagate itself to the farthest end of the world because of the printing press. In short, the effect of the invention can be noticed in every department of life.