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Taking medical knowledge as her case study, Marcus provides an illuminating account of the complexities entailed in Counter-Reformation censorship of "useful" books. Marcus memorably describes expurgation as "the dark side of commonplacing" (p. 94); its practitioners reversed the humanist practice of noting edifying passages to achieve new, censorious ends. Marcus explores a largely futile attempt to enlist a committee of (predominantly lay) experts to compile lists of expurgations at the University of Padua, a celebrated centre of early modern medical knowledge. [Extracted from the article]