Many variations exist within the East Asian tradition; particular contexts, situations and genres each developed their own typical forms. Some highlights are shown here. Books printed in the traditional thread-bound form are still being published, and the form remains an inspiration for artists and book designers.

The book form called detchō shown here was occasionally used for a few centuries, but never became standard. With its double-sided pages glued together at the back, and folios also glued together two-by-two along a small strip between them, the form looks somewhat like a codex without its covers or sewn binding. A similar form has been found in Dunhuang, and Western influence can be imagined. The book contains handwritten instructions on how to perform the Buddhist huṃ ritual.

East Asian Library Special Collections, BQ1873.J3 T75 1118

For further reading

Tanaka Kei 田中敬. Detchōkō: kochōsō to yamatotoji 粘葉考: 蝴蝶装と大和綴. Tōkyō: Hayakawa Tosho, 1979 (or. 1932).

Rubbings taken from incised inscriptions on commemorative stone slabs may have been a predecessor to printing itself, and collections formed into albums are a recognized Chinese genre. In this case, we see a very rare example of this technique applied to non-Chinese items: the first Egyptian and Greek objects brought into China by the diplomat Duanfang (1861–1911). Published using photolithography, the items have notes indicating their original size.

East Asian Library Special Collections, PJ1521 .A43

For further reading

Chen, Yixu Eliza, and Helena Chen-Abair. “Duanfang’s Egyptian catalogue, 1910: Late Qing Egyptomania and antiquarian practices.” Carved, cast, and ground: antiquarianism and craft in East Asia, 1700s–1900s, edited by Michael J. Hatch, Michele Matteini and Weitian Yan. Leiden: Brill, forthcoming.

Tian Tian. “Duanfang’s Egyptian rubbings: the first Egyptian collection in Late Imperial China.” Antiquity 99, no. 406 (2025): 1129-42.

When Protestant missionaries were allowed into China after the First Opium War (1839–1842), some adopted Chinese printing technology while also investing in Western presses. Needing to learn spoken languages rather than Classical Chinese for their proselytization, they developed romanizations for “dialects” such as the one spoken in Ningbo, a treaty port. Their printed books were often of a hybrid form; the Hymns book shown here is bound in Chinese style, printed in Western layout, on folded Chinese paper.

Gift of Henry William Rankin, Class of 1873

Princeton Special Collections, N-003610

For further reading

Chen, Minjie. “Opium, Gospel, and the Conquest of the Babel.” Cotsen Children’s Library Blog (December 2, 2022). Accessed May 20, 2025. https://blogs.princeton.edu/cotsen/2022/12/opium-gospel-babel/

By the early 19th century long serialized narratives (gōkan) had become popular in Japan, as had color prints and image-heavy illustrated stories. One particular direction such works took was when the attractive colored covers of the different issues could be combined into one large picture made up of many covers. The title shown here consists of three issues, and narrates the tragic story of Ohana and her lover Hanshichi.

East Asian Library Special Collections, PL795.K64 O53 1843

For further reading

Moretti, Laura, and Satō Yukiko (ed.) Graphic narratives from early modern Japan: the world of kusazōshi. Leiden: Brill, 2024.

Published in San Francisco (‘Gold Mountain’ in Chinese), the Songs of the Gold Mountain is a poetry collection by Chinese immigrants in a Cantonese folk style. The volumes were printed by the bookstore Tai Quong in a hybrid form: the first volume is bound in the Chinese thread-bound style, the second in a more Western style, while inside the layout remains Chinese, but the paper and technology are Western.

East Asian Library Special Collections, PL3164 .J567 1911

For further reading

Hom, Marlon K. (sel. and tr.) Songs of Gold Mountain: Cantonese rhymes from San Francisco Chinatown. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987.

Lü Jingren has been the most influential Chinese book designer since book publishing restarted after the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976). The book shown here is often regarded as the very start of that renewal of artistic book making. Inside are volumes of the Thousand Character Classic, traditionally bound, but it is the use of (seemingly) Chinese printing woodblocks (with characters partly mirrored, partly straight) as a cover board which creates something totally new.

East Asian Library Special Collections, NK3634.C465 Z48 1999e

For further reading

Lü Jingren 吕敬人. Jingren shuji sheji 敬人书籍设计. Changchun: Jilin Meishu Chubanshe, 2000.

Sugiura Kōhei. Books, letterforms and design in Asia: Sugiura Kohei in conversation with Asian designers. Mumbai: ADARG and Marg Foundation, 2014.

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