This article expresses the need for an approach to scholarly editing that is more historically rooted than has hitherto been the case in Anglo-American textual criticism. It gives a new understanding of what has happened in the field since the “sociological turn” since J. J. McGann and D. F. McKenzie and argues for a realignment between text and the material forms of the book, and for scholarly editors to pay closer attention to the granularity of the texts that have come down to us from the past
