Consuming Texts

This book is a history of reading in the British Isles from 1695-1870 that focuses on “common” rather than professional readers and which explores a range of previously undervalued sources.

Consuming Texts explores the history of reading in the British Isles during a period in which the printed word became all pervasive. Beginning with an overview of recent work, it goes on to provide a series of case studies of individual readers and the communities to which they belonged. From wealthy readers of ‘amatory fiction’ in the early Eighteenth century, through to men and women reading surreptitiously at the Victorian railway bookstall, it argues that a variety of new reading communities emerged during this period.

STEPHEN COLCLOUGH is Lecturer in Nineteenth and Twentieth-century Literature at the University of Wales, Bangor. From 2001 – 2005 he was AHRC Fellow in Book History at the Centre for Writing and Publishing, University of Reading. He has published widely on the history of reading and text dissemination.

Introduction: Consuming Texts * Reading Has a History * Reworking the Word: Readers and Their Manuscript Books, 1695-1730 * Diversities of Reading Practice, 1695-1770 * The Circulating Library, Book Club and Subscription Library- Readers and Reading Communities, 1770-1800 * Communal Practice and Individual Response- Reading in the Late-Romantic Period * Towards a Mass Audience, Or, John Clare and the Problem of the Unknown Public * Conclusion: Texts Consumed * Bibliography