Le Projet Gutenberg

Marie LebertProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.1

Word count: 74K words
Chapters: 8

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Le Projet Gutenberg (1971-2008) by Marie LebertAuthor: Lebert, Marie,Language: French, Class: Z: Bibliography, Library science, Release Date: Oct 26, 2008

Editor's review

This book traces the development of Project Gutenberg in French from 1971 to 2008. Starting with Michael Hart's idea of inventing the eBook, it shows how a volunteer-driven project of free electronic texts gradually accumulated, expanded, and shaped the digital reading landscape that followed. Rather than a technical manual, it reads as a project history and a record of ideals: it asks why books should be digitized and made freely available, and what specific problems that commitment raised in terms of copyright, formats, and collaboration. The narrative is plain and heavily documentary, making it useful background reading on digital libraries and the public circulation of knowledge. Readers can see how early eBook practitioners worked and what they valued, and can grasp the tension between today's eBook industry and public digital resources. Because it was written early, its figures and progress should be checked against later public sources rather than treated as a current status report.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in the history of Project Gutenberg and the origins of eBooks
Students and teachers studying digital libraries and the public circulation of knowledge
Publishing and library professionals seeking historical background
Readers willing to read French material and interested in open access ideals

Not a good fit for

Researchers needing the latest project data and current statistics
Readers looking for tutorials on eBook production and format conversion
General readers who prefer literary reading and have no interest in project history

Reading tips

Read chronologically: first grasp the phases of the project from 1971 to 2008, then revisit key milestones.
Mark passages on copyright, volunteer collaboration, and format choices as you read; these are central to understanding the project's ideals.
Browse Project Gutenberg's public pages alongside the book to compare its account with the project's current form.
For coursework or writing, quote the book's specific statements about Hart's vision rather than relying on secondhand paraphrase.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

How is this book related to Project Gutenberg?

It is a French-language documentary work by Marie Lebert devoted to the history of Project Gutenberg from 1971 to 2008. It was released by the project as an electronic text, so it is a record and retrospective of the project itself, not an official operations manual.

Does the book include methods for producing eBooks?

It does not include hands-on production tutorials. The book focuses on the project's history, ideals, and collaboration; for format conversion, typesetting, or proofreading workflows, look for dedicated technical documentation and guides.

Is it suitable as an academic citation source?

It can serve as reference material on the early history of Project Gutenberg, but because it was written early and is limited in length, formal academic writing should cross-check it against the project's public materials and relevant scholarship before citing.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Marie Lebert Author · French

Marie Lebert is a French translator and researcher of books and digital publishing. She holds a doctorate in linguistics from the Sorbonne and has worked in translation and library roles at international organizations in several countries; she now lives in Australia. Her research focuses on multilingualism online, e-books and the history of translation, and her writing for general readers traces how books have moved from print to digital form. Representative works include La Jérusalem médiévale, Del libro impreso al libro digital, Le Projet Gutenberg and Le Livre 010101: Enquête, and 47 of her titles are held in the collection. Her e-books and writings on Project Gutenberg are distributed free of charge through the University of Toronto's NEF and Project Gutenberg, making them easy to access online. Public information about her is limited, and her works centre on digital publishing and changing reading practices.