While all literature before the late 15th century circulated in manuscript, and much after, we tend to lose sight of this when we use modern editions on the printed page or computer screen. This module takes a practical approach to working with literature in original manuscripts. It introduces you to the manuscript book, its producers and readers, and to the skills and methodologies used to work with manuscripts, which you practice and discuss in workshop-seminars. Assessment is by project work: for example, making your own edition of a text from a manuscript, or writing an account of a manuscript book. The module draws on the resources built up for manuscript study at Birmingham, including manuscript books in Special Collections, the Library's rich holidngs of facsimiles, and the files of the Manuscripts of the West Midlands Project. The module will assume some previous experience of reading Middle English texts (for example, on the Literature Foundation module).