What happened inGermanyaround the year of 1450?

Passage 2

The earliest printed book we know today appeared inChinain the year 868, andmetal type was in use inKoreaat the beginning of the fifteenth century, but it was inGermanyaroundthe year 1450 that a printing press using movable metal type was invented.

Capitalism turned printing from an invention intoan industry. Right from the start, book printing and publish­ing were organizedon capitalist lines. 'The biggest sixteenth- century printer, Plantin ofAntwerp, had twenty-four printing presses and employed more than a hundredworkers. Only a small fraction of the population was literate, but thepro­duction of books grew at an extraordinary speed. By 1500 some twentymillion volumes had already been printed.

The immediate effect of printing was to increasethe cir­culation of works that were already popular in the handwritten form,while less popular works went out of circulation. Publishers were interestedonly in books that would sell fairly quickly in sufficient numbers to cover thecosts of production and make a profit. Thus, while printing enormouslyincreased access to books by making cheap, high-volume production possible, italso reduced choice.

The great cultural impact of printing was that itfacili­tated the growth of national languages. Most early books were printed inLatin, but the market for Latin was limited, and in its pursuit of largermarkets the book trade soon produced translations into the national languagesemerging at the time. Printing indeed played a key role in standardizing andstabilizing these lan­guages by fixing them in print, and producingdictionaries and grammar books.

What does the speaker say about the printer,Plantin of Antwerp?

What was the immediate effect of printing?

 What was the great cultural impact ofprinting?

短文2主要讲述印刷机的传播。第12题，在公元868年中国已有第一本印刷成册的书籍，而德国却到1450年左右才发明铅字印刷机。16世纪最大的铅字印刷机，Plantin of Antwerp由24台印刷机组合而成，并需要雇用超过百名人员才能运作；对应第13题。而印刷术产生的立即影响就是将原来只能由手写的书籍文本更加普及并提升知名著作的发行量，对应第14题。除此之外，原来多用拉丁文撰写的书籍，也因为印刷术的普及，使出版商可以以更低的成本印制营利，出版成一般国家或地区人民能理解的语言，以赚取更大利润。因此印刷术对欧洲地区能代表各地国家语言的发展有着重大影响；对应第15题。