Chapter 100 - Traditional Printing (A Technical Article)

The accompanying shopkeeper was very enthusiastic in pointing out the entire printing process. In one hall, printers were at work. The carved bookplates were numbered according to the Thousand Character Classic and placed on shelves. Apprentices, following the numbers called out by the master, moved the plates one by one to a large, specialized desk. In the center of the hall were several large vats filled with ink. Apprentices used wooden buckets to draw the ink, brought it to each master printer, and poured it into an ink tray.

During printing, the master printer used a special cylindrical, flat-bottomed brush to dip into the ink, spread it evenly on the surface of the block, then carefully covered it with paper. He would gently brush the paper, and the text or image would be printed on it. The paper was then lifted from the block and laid on a rack to air dry, completing the printing process. The shopkeeper told Zhou Dongtian that a skilled printer could produce 1,500-2,000 sheets a day. A good printing block could be used for ten thousand impressions.

To Zhou Dongtian, the process of carving the woodblocks was somewhat like carving a seal, just with more characters. The printing process was the reverse of using a seal. With a seal, the seal is on top and the paper is below. Woodblock printing was more like making a rubbing. However, the characters on a woodblock were in relief and reversed, whereas the characters on a typical stone stele were intaglio and in the correct orientation. Furthermore, in a rubbing, the ink is applied to the paper, while in woodblock printing, the ink is applied to the block. Woodblock printing inherited techniques from seals, rubbings, and dyeing, so its invention in China was not accidental.

If a printed book sold well, the bookstore’s investment in printing was a one-time cost. After that, everything beyond the cost of paper, ink, and labor was pure profit. If it didn’t sell well, the money invested in carving the blocks was lost. The carved blocks were either planed down for reuse or left to gather dust in a warehouse. In times of turmoil or if the bookstore went out of business, a large number of carved blocks would end up as firewood. Bookstore owners were very cautious about commissioning the carving of a new book, ensuring that every book could be sold.

Therefore, the number of printing plates a bookstore owned was a significant part of its capital—especially the plates for books that were guaranteed to sell once printed. The shopkeeper proudly told Zhou Dongtian that his bookstore had over ten thousand “perennially printable” plates, which was considered top-tier among the bookstores in Nanjing.

Zhou Dongtian, however, was not impressed. The Imperial Academy in the Southern Song Dynasty was said to have over two hundred thousand printing blocks. In physical terms, this was a remarkable number; the space required to stack over two hundred thousand carved blocks would be astounding, not to mention the manpower and resources spent carving them. But in terms of the information they contained, two hundred thousand plates were just two hundred thousand pages of books. At two to three hundred pages per book, that was only about 1,000 books. Considering that the number of characters per page in a block-printed book was generally less than in a modern printed book, the amount of information was even smaller. It was merely the scale of a small library. The official printing office in Hangzhou in the late Qing Dynasty had only one hundred and sixty thousand plates.

A complete Siku Quanshu (Complete Library in Four Sections) contained 4,000 types of books, barely the scale of a small-town public library. Zhou Dongtian knew that the scale of anything in the handicraft era was very small. Even using 19th-century technology, the printing industry of this era was completely outmatched.

Zhou Dongtian looked at the mountain of printing plates piled in the courtyard and felt a sense of melancholy. Chinese printing technology, in its large-scale application, had remained stuck at the level of expensive woodblock printing. Publishing was difficult, and books were rare and costly. Many works were lost to time because they never had the chance to be published or reprinted. This was undoubtedly one of the reasons why China gradually fell behind the West.

He wandered on and walked into the second hall, where something immediately caught his interest—they were carving illustrations. The shopkeeper said they were carving “portraits” for a novel. The bookstore was working on a new edition of Water Margin.

“This is a ‘comprehensive version’ that I painstakingly tracked down, not the ‘simplified version’ you find elsewhere,” the shopkeeper said with a look of pride. “The one with the ‘three campaigns’!”

Zhou Dongtian wasn’t very knowledgeable about the different versions of Water Margin and didn’t understand the difference between “simplified” and “comprehensive,” so he just mumbled a few words of agreement. Suddenly, Mei Lin asked, “Do you print The Golden Lotus here?” He slightly regretted asking—it wasn’t good for his image!

“Yes, yes,” the shopkeeper said, not finding it strange at all. “We sell a version titled The Newly Carved Illustrated and Critiqued Golden Lotus on consignment from a colleague. Not only is it exquisitely printed, but it also contains two hundred illustrations. It’s a rare item.”

When he asked the price, he learned it cost one tael of silver, which was quite expensive. Mei Lin decided to buy it.

“This book is in traditional characters, without even punctuation. Are you sure you want to buy it to read?” Zhou Dongtian asked when the shopkeeper had stepped away for a moment.

“Of course I can’t read it easily, but collecting a copy now will make it a valuable resource in the future, a rare edition!”

After a while, the shopkeeper scurried back with the book, which was housed in four book cases. It was heavy and substantial. Zhou Dongtian casually picked up a volume and flipped through a few pages. The scent of ink filled the air, and the paper was of fine quality. The carving and printing were both of a high standard. Because it used water-based ink, the pages were printed on one side only, so it was bound into an unusually large number of volumes—thirty-six in total.

Each chapter was accompanied by two illustrations. The carving was much better than the New Year pictures Zhou Dongtian had seen outside. Some of the images were inevitably licentious and extremely explicit, giving it the feel of an erotic novel.

If we were to publish it, our artwork would be a hundred times better, Zhou Dongtian thought. If nothing else, the anatomy alone would be superior. Is there a market for a ‘Golden Lotus’ H-manga? It would be too much trouble to create from scratch. I wonder if Japan has produced a manga on this theme, and if anyone has brought it over.

A question suddenly occurred to him, and he asked, “Who is the author of this book?” He wondered if he could solve this historical mystery in this era, so close to the time the work was published.

“The book is signed ‘Lanling Xiaoxiao Sheng,’ but everyone says it was written by Mr. Fengzhou.”

Mr. Fengzhou was Wang Shizhen. This rumor had circulated shortly after the book’s publication and remained the most popular theory until modern times, so it was nothing new to Zhou Dongtian. He was slightly disappointed.

“Some also say it was the work of a certain old eunuch,” the shopkeeper said in a low voice. “That’s harder to say.”

Zhou Dongtian nodded. It was clear that he wouldn’t get a definitive answer in this era either.

The atmosphere of the late Ming was quite open, and matters of sex and romance were not considered “shameful.” Seeing that the two gentlemen were very interested, the shopkeeper brought out a pile of similar novels for them to choose from, ranging from the famous The Carnal Prayer Mat to the lesser-known The Story of the Infatuated Old Woman. There were twenty to thirty different titles in total, some of which were lost in the old world. According to the shopkeeper, these books sold well and were perennial sellers. Zhou Dongtian flipped through a few and thought this was also a good business opportunity. He immediately took out ten taels of silver and bought the entire lot.

The bookstore owner, having made another good sale, became even more attentive. He answered every question in detail. Zhou Dongtian turned his interest back to the carving workshop. He noticed that the workers carving the illustrations were different from before; they seemed to be carving some kind of incomplete pattern. After a moment of thought, he suddenly understood: they were carving plates for multi-block color printing.

Walking into the next hall confirmed his thought. They were doing “multi-block color printing.”

Woodblock printing was generally done in a single color. Starting from the Five Dynasties period, some had experimented with color printing. The process involved applying several different colors to different parts of a single block at the same time, then printing it on paper in one go to create a color print. This method was called the “single-block multi-color printing method.” The famous Tianjin Yangliuqing New Year pictures were produced using this method.

This method was low-cost and fast, but the colors tended to mix and bleed, and the sharp boundaries between color blocks made the designs look stiff.

From the Yuan Dynasty onwards, the so-called “multi-block multi-color printing,” or “chromatic printing,” emerged. This involved carving a separate block for each color needed. Each printing block was coated with a different color and then printed sequentially on the same sheet of paper. The process of multi-block color printing continued for a long time. Besides printing presses, it was used in textile dyeing factories until the 20th century.

In the Ming Dynasty, Nanjing had become a center for color printing, and most bookstores had the capability for it.

Because chromatic printing was much more expensive—requiring as many identical carved blocks as there were colors—color printing in books during the Ming and Qing periods was generally limited to just two colors, red and black. Only New Year pictures used a wider range of colors.

The illustrations being printed in the bookstore at that moment used only three colors. However, the shopkeeper was already very proud, stating that this time he was “sparing no expense, seeking only perfection.”

Throughout the tour, Zhou Dongtian learned from the shopkeeper that there were about a thousand different types of books that could be printed in all of Nanjing, divided into nine categories. Tens of thousands of artisans, clerks, and merchants made their living from this thriving trade. Books were not only sold to various provinces but also exported in large quantities, especially to Japan and Korea.

However, the best-selling books were the “collections of contemporary essays,” which were essentially “civil service exam preparation books.” Although new books had to be compiled and carved every year, this genre remained a perennial bestseller. Zhou and Mei couldn’t help but sigh at this.

Cai Yibang guessed that since the two chiefs were so interested in the bookstore, they were very likely planning to open one themselves. As a Nanjing native with several poor relatives in this trade, he quickly seized the opportunity to recommend them to Zhou Dongtian.

Zhou Dongtian thought this was acceptable. After all, skilled block carvers were still needed—one of his original intentions in coming to Nanjing was to recruit a group of master carvers for the printing factory in Lin’gao, and the Hangzhou printing factory would need them as well. He readily agreed and asked him to recruit as many printing workers as possible.