This was interesting, but you relied fairly heavily on Carey's own account. Was a circulation of 10,000 really enough to make The Olive Branch the best-selling book in America? If not, how does this affect the credibility of the rest of the passage?
Dan, I couldn't find the exact numbers, but it seems that a book (presumed to sell well) would probably be printed in a run of 1,000. So, for example in Britain around that same time, the first printing of 'Pride and Prejudice' was a run of 1000 and then later a second printing of 1000 was needed, so that 2000 copies of that book were printed in that year. And I'm only guessing here, but I think that 10,000 was alot at that time.
This was interesting, but you relied fairly heavily on Carey's own account. Was a circulation of 10,000 really enough to make The Olive Branch the best-selling book in America? If not, how does this affect the credibility of the rest of the passage?
Dan, I couldn't find the exact numbers, but it seems that a book (presumed to sell well) would probably be printed in a run of 1,000. So, for example in Britain around that same time, the first printing of 'Pride and Prejudice' was a run of 1000 and then later a second printing of 1000 was needed, so that 2000 copies of that book were printed in that year. And I'm only guessing here, but I think that 10,000 was alot at that time.