Paper is expensive, ink is expensive, and copying books is even more expensive.

Not to mention, many commentaries on scriptures and other books are kept privately by various scholars and will not be taken out and shared.

"Your Majesty, engraving printing can greatly reduce the cost of books, a volume of 10,000-word books, as long as fifty or sixty engravings, the engraving is fixed, the more books printed, the lower the cost."

"How much is fifty or sixty engravings?" Li Zhi asked.

"A set of engraving fifty or sixty yuan, it doesn't cost much, its cost is just to write and engrave, writing a set of editions is actually about a thousand texts, and the price of copying books is about the same. As long as the cost of engraving is the cost of the engraving board and the salary of the engraving craftsman, an excellent craftsman can engrave an engraving plate in a day, but the salary of the engraving craftsman is far less than that of the copyist. ”

No matter how good the engraving master is, he is just a craftsman, and no matter how down-and-out the copyist is, he is also a reader.

How much does a craftsman earn in a day? A hundred dollars is good, even if a set of engraving costs 60 work, it is only 6,000 yuan, and the cost of materials can be how much.

A set of engraving engravings costs less than ten dollars.

If only one book is printed, it is indeed not as good as copying a book, copying a volume is only a thousand yuan, and copying it is even better.

But what if it's ten, hundred, or even a thousand?

Printing a thousand copies and printing one, the cost of engraving remains the same, but it is just the binding cost of more paper and ink, but that is a small head.

Copying a thousand copies is a thousand times the price of copying a book, and a consistent thousand copies will cost a thousand.

Printing a book of ten copies, printing a thousand copies may cost only one or two hundred.

The larger the number, the lower the cost of engraving, this is the advantage of engraving, not to mention, engraving has another benefit, as long as the writer is literate, the engraving person does not need to be literate, and even a version of the proofreading is good, you can keep printing later, no longer worry about printing errors, do not need to copy by hand, this book should be proofread.

The key point is that it is easy to train one or two hundred or even hundreds of engraving masters, and it is easier to find a group of printing and binding workers, but it is not easy to find thousands of copyists to copy books at the same time, and this is not just a matter of cost.

"Your Majesty, if a set of nine classics of the imperial imperial examination is handed over to the minister to print, the minister can print 10,000 sets in a year!"

The Nine Classics are the Three Rites and Three Transmissions plus Yi, Shu, and Poems, which are the textbooks of the Ming Classics, and the content of the examination is from these nine Confucian classics.

"Printing 10,000 sets of the Nine Classics a year?" Li Zhi's eyes lit up, staring at Li Xiao like a devouring tiger.

"Ten thousand sets of Nine Classics." Li Xiao said confidently.

"How much does a set cost?" Li Zhi asked again.

As the saying goes, the text of the Nine Classics is no more than 478,995 words. The boy recites 300 words a day, not for five years, and it is slightly catchy.

It is said that it is a lot, but there are a lot of words in a set, more than 470,000 words.

One volume of 10,000 words, that would also be forty-eight volumes.

Chang'an's powerful book copyist, if he copies 10,000 a day, he has to copy it for a month and a half.

Li Xiao's engraving printing, a plate is more than 100 words, a set of plates needs more than 2,600 copies, if you want to print 10,000 sets, you must have several sets of engravings, lithographic plates need tens of thousands of copies, this is a big project.

However, the larger the engraving print, the lower the cost.

"The board money is about five or six hundred, the writing plate is about two hundred, the paper and ink money are slightly more expensive, and the food and food money for printing and binding workers is additional."

"You just say how much is a set of nine scriptures?" Li Zhi didn't understand the cost of printing, so he asked directly.

"If 10,000 copies are printed, the cost of a set of nine classics and forty-eight volumes can be controlled within 30 volumes."

Li Zhi heard that he calculated in his heart, if he copied the book, a set of nine classics would cost at least nearly fifty yuan, and the cost of paper and ink pen would have to be calculated separately, and the paper and ink would cost a lot. In general, it is estimated that a normal copy of a set of Nine Classics will cost no less than 100 yuan, even if it is worse, it will not be much.

Therefore, in this era, many people borrow books and copy them by themselves. And if the family conditions are average, you can't afford to copy it.

The cost of copying a set is finally nearly 100 times, and the cost of printing a set is only 30 times?

That's less than one of three.

"Your Majesty, the key is that paper is too expensive, if Your Majesty gives the minister some paper-making and ink-making craftsmen, the minister can also reduce the cost a lot."

Although papermaking came from the Han Dynasty, there was a leap in technological progress during the Northern and Southern Dynasties, but although papermaking was greatly improved, paper was still very expensive, and the price of paper in the Tang Dynasty was estimated to be more than ten times that of the Song Dynasty. If it is compared with the Ming and Qing dynasties, it is dozens of times different.

It is not difficult to say that papermaking is not difficult, and it is not easy to say that it is simple, but most of the scholars treasure it.

"Do you have a way to reduce the cost of paper and ink?" Li Zhi asked.

"Yes."

Even if Li Xiao has not yet researched a new papermaking technology, as long as the process is improved, the efficiency will be greatly increased, and the production management level of later generations is comparable to that of this era, and the cost of small workshop production is higher.

If the scale is increased, the efficiency is improved, and even the raw materials are controlled, then the cost will definitely be greatly reduced.

Besides, the purpose of printing books is to popularize and promote, not to collect, so it does not necessarily require very good paper. The quality of the paper is poor, and the cost can naturally be reduced a lot.

As for the ink, now this technology is in the hands of the Li family, and now the cost is higher, that is also less output, if the workshop is expanded, the output is increased, the overall cost can also be reduced.

"If you have your own paper mill and ink mill, then change the previous album and scroll books to thread-bound flip books, and the paper quality will be slightly reduced, then the minister can reduce the cost of each set of nine classics to about 20 times."

The emperor's eyes couldn't help but widen, just now he said that thirty sets of sets, he felt that it was too cheap.

But now, Li Xiao actually cut off one-third of the cost with one sword.

"How is that possible?"

A set of nine classics has nearly 500,000 words, only 20 runs?

If 10,000 sets are printed, then it will only be 200,000?

Li Zhi believes that if there really is a set of 20 sets of nine classics, then there will definitely be many people willing to buy them. Not to mention others, Li Zhi is willing to pay this money, and the teachers and students of Guozijian, Tianxia State School, and County School add up to a lot, and there are hundreds of states and thousands of counties in the world, adding up to tens of thousands, and less than 100,000 will not be less.

And that's not even counting those private schools.

Twenty sets, Li Zhi is definitely willing to buy it.

He only suspected that Li Xiao was bragging. It takes nearly 100 times to copy a set, and you only need 20 times to print a set?

As everyone knows, Li Xiao is thinking that if the papermaking technology can be improved, then the cost of engraving printing will indeed be very low. A set of nine classics, if well controlled, will be less than 300 times for writing and engraving, and the rest will be paper, ink, printing and binding wages, and the more printed, the thinner the cost can be.

Compared with the current high price of a book that costs a few dollars at every turn, a book costs dozens or even a dozen dollars is what it should be.