Il-Ktieb Malti
(PIN: Kullana Kulturali n.55, 2003, x + 322pp., illus., qoxra: ritratt tal-‘Mylsen’ ta’ M.A.Vassalli, 1791
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This book is one of the firsts achieved by PIN. Although we have had books as well as articles about the history of printing in Malta, this is the first book to survey the Maltese book in its cultural, and to a smaller extent in its economic, context. The author is doubly qualified to do this task, being a well-known man of letters as well as a man greatly experienced in designing and producing books, a pioneer in the production of shared poetry anthologies and of local “street” literature of a sophisticated type.
Fenech writes most authoritatively on fields with which he has been associated in person. He is therefore very good on the history of the Maltese textbook during the last forty years but he is also excellent on the 1930s which are by way of being a Golden Age… Fenech is very informative about the publishers, led by Paul Mizzi’s Klabb Kotba Maltin, who have risen since 1970, and also about the printing presses active with varying success during this same period, but I suspect that the period 1970-2004 already deserves a book on its own with greater emphasis on personalities as well as on technical and economic developments.
The volume is well printed, copiously annotated and lavishly illustrated. It also has a good, if not exhaustive, bibliography [though] it needed a little editing to remove repetitions. |
Paul Xuereb
“History of the Maltese Book”,
Treasures of Malta n.32, 2005
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| Not too many other people in Malta could have written such a book. To use the eternal cliché, VF definitely needs no introduction with anybody even minimally connected with books on the island. |
Louis J. Scerri
“Perspectives on printed pages”,
The Sunday Times, 1.8.2004
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| Fenech joqgħod attent ħafna li ma jintilifx f’xi akkwata partikolari speċjalment f’suġġetti li diġà ġew trattati minn awturi oħrajn imma li jimxi fuq linji ċari u definiti li verament jiktbu l-istorja tal-ktieb Malti. |
Godwin Ellul
“Il-Ktieb Malti”,
In-Nazzjon, 27.8.2004
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