Reading, Publishing and the Formation of Literary Taste in England, 1880-1914

Mary Hammond is Lecturer in Literature and Book History at the Open University, UK.

Shortlisted for the SHARP/DeLong prize for the best book history monograph of 2006 'This splendid study recounts the ideological battleground of the fin-de-siècle when new literary tastes were being formed and the canon of modern English letters as we know it was being constructed. In this impeccably researched and exquisitely written book, Hammond shows herself to be that rare scholar, equal parts book historian, literary theorist, and critic of novelistic form. She vividly uncovers the public spheres in which the novel circulated in late Victorian England. Every study of English modernism will have to contend with Hammond's keen account that links modernism closely to its late Victorian predecessors and to the cut and thrust of a marketplace of print and prestige. Every book historian and literary scholar will have to take note of Hammond's innovations with the archive and the vistas they open.' Priya Joshi, Temple University, USA 'The book is aimed squarely at an academic market and will be required reading for those studying the publishing history of the period... The chapters on the free library system, the rise of W.H. Smith and Oxford University Press's role in popularising classic literature are particularly interesting and display a great breadth of scholarship...' Rare Books Newsletter ’... this is a valuable work whose case study examples open out our understanding of the role played by production, distribution and reception in catering for or denying general British reading public interests and tastes... It is well worth a read.’ Review of English Studies ’Hammond's study illuminates the rich world of the period's printing culture, so much of which is unseen today... this is [...] the value of Hammond's book, which both sheds new light on the dimmer reaches of that literary environment and also invites further explorations of its contours.’ English Literature in Transition

• Contents: Introduction: Modernity and the reading public; ’The great fiction bore’: free libraries and their users; Sensation and sensibility: W.H. Smith and the railway bookstall; ’People read so much now and reflect so little’: Oxford University Press and the classics series; ’The little woman’ and ’The boomster’: Marie Corelli, Hall Caine and the literary field of the 1890s; ’Mr Bennett and Mrs Barclay’: the literary field before the First World War; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.