This is a noted systematic survey of the Liberal Party for the key period 1867 to 1905, when the party was in its prime. It is particularly strong on the career of W.E. Gladstone after 1868. It explores key policy themes, and it is an important work placed alongside J.R. Vincent's classic The Formation of The Liberal Party 1857-1868. The book examines the question of what leading Liberal politicians understood the purpose of the Liberal Party to be, and what were their reasons and assumptions which led to their supporting or promoting particular policies. Professor Hamer examines at length the philosophies and strategies of Joseph Chamberlain, Gladstone, Sir William Harcourt, Lord Rosebery and Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. He also highlights the major organizing and controlling themes, both in relation to their own ideas and in relation to their Conservative opponents.

Literature for the masses appeared on an unprecedented scale in the first half of the 19th-century. This was the earliest response to new and voracious demands for cheap books of all kinds. This famous and innovative book enquires as to the nature of this new material, the responses to it, and its audiences amidst the new reading public which it illuminates. The technological advances in printing, and the urbanisation of the population were key influences. So, too, were new entrepreneurial energies amongst author and publishers. Professor James shows what were the realities and the resonances of this new culture. He examines the effects of a new urban culture, its complicated class relations, the difficult history of the radical press, and the relationships between popular fiction and 'literature'. His is a detailed and engaging, well illustrated study of the growth of literacy and the vivacious and enormously varied popular literature of both entertainment, improvement, and instruction which was published. This included chapbooks and broadsheets, plagiarisms of Dickens in penny serial numbers, gothic tales of terror, 'blood-and-murder', 'ghost-and-goblin' fiction, exuberant historical novels, domestic stories, romances, and tales of fashionable life. The first edition was welcomed by Raymond Williams, who wrote that "Dr. James has done so thorough a job that all students of the period will be permanently in his debt....the success of the enquiry, in research terms is outstanding: a solid contribution to the necessary rewriting of nineteenth-century cultural history." This expanded edition includes new material on how this important study started with, D. Phil work on the Barry Ono Collection; existing non-academic collectors and enthusiasts (Lawson, Algar, Jay, Medcraft, Summers); theatrical artistes (Barry Ono, Frank Pettingell); research on 'Old Boys blood and thunder' serials (E.S. Turner), early academic studies of popular fiction and its audience; literary studies (J.M.S. Tompkins, Margaret Dalziel); readership (Richard Altick, Raymond Williams); social issues (Q.D. Leavis, Richard Hoggart). The author has also added a short epilogue on other work in the field by radical historians, including E.P. Thompson, Ian Haywood, and Rohan McWilliam. On working-class readership (by David Vincent); on serial fiction and popular traditions, journalism, melodrama and the visual arts; and on recent studies of Edward Lloyd, J.M. Rymer, G.W.M. Reynolds; reprinted fiction by Valancourt et al. He has added a guide to relevant websites for ongoing study.

This work offers a wonderfully illustrated guide – and a rigorous analysis - of popular print and literature in all its many forms in the first half of the 19th century.It provides a unique collection of illustrated popular literature published between the events of ‘Peterloo’ in 1819 and the Great Exhibition of 1851, much never reprinted before. This was a time when the expansive growth of literacy led to the rapid and diverse evolution of popular culture, of publishing and print. This did much to transform the life experiences of millions. The printing press, combined with the railways and the telegraph, was a key agent of mass change.Louis James gives a picture of what the working classes were reading and a fascinating insight into their interest and concerns – their sports, work, crime, politics, religion and entertainments. His detailed introduction places all of this in its context of the contemporary cultural and social movements.The book profusely illustrates the fare which was offered: woodcut pictures, broadsheets and ballads, sensational Gothic novels issued in parts, newspapers and magazines, melodramatic penny dreadfuls published weekly in parts, and tracts of all kinds.The work examines this material in its many aspects, and from both sides of the social mirror. As well as showing the material, and analysing its significance, the book deals with official attempts to damp down or suppress the revolutionary new political and cultural press which served the new literacy. This did much to change taste, and ways of thinking and feeling.  The book brings thus not only brings together a great deal of unusual and otherwise inaccessible illustration, it also offers a multi-facetted discussion of how the material was received, and its longer-term cultural influences.The new edition also includes a survey of studies in popular culture including song (A.L. Lloyd); the popular arts (Barbara Jones, Marx and Lambert, Panofsky, Gombrich); cartoons and graphic satire (Meisel, Maidment); the conventions and influence of popular melodrama and woodcuts, and a case study of the fiction of G.W.M. Reynolds. Also, a list of relevant web sites.

This is a noted systematic survey of the Liberal Party for the key period 1867 to 1905, when the party was in its prime. It is particularly strong on the career of W.E. Gladstone after 1868. It explores key policy themes, and it is an important work placed alongside J.R. Vincent's classic The Formation of The Liberal Party 1857-1868. The book examines the question of what leading Liberal politicians understood the purpose of the Liberal Party to be, and what were their reasons and assumptions which led to their supporting or promoting particular policies. Professor Hamer examines at length the philosophies and strategies of Joseph Chamberlain, Gladstone, Sir William Harcourt, Lord Rosebery and Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman. He also highlights the major organizing and controlling themes, both in relation to their own ideas and in relation to their Conservative opponents.

Literature for the masses appeared on an unprecedented scale in the first half of the 19th-century. This was the earliest response to new and voracious demands for cheap books of all kinds. This famous and innovative book enquires as to the nature of this new material, the responses to it, and its audiences amidst the new reading public which it illuminates. The technological advances in printing, and the urbanisation of the population were key influences. So, too, were new entrepreneurial energies amongst author and publishers. Professor James shows what were the realities and the resonances of this new culture. He examines the effects of a new urban culture, its complicated class relations, the difficult history of the radical press, and the relationships between popular fiction and 'literature'. His is a detailed and engaging, well illustrated study of the growth of literacy and the vivacious and enormously varied popular literature of both entertainment, improvement, and instruction which was published. This included chapbooks and broadsheets, plagiarisms of Dickens in penny serial numbers, gothic tales of terror, 'blood-and-murder', 'ghost-and-goblin' fiction, exuberant historical novels, domestic stories, romances, and tales of fashionable life. The first edition was welcomed by Raymond Williams, who wrote that "Dr. James has done so thorough a job that all students of the period will be permanently in his debt....the success of the enquiry, in research terms is outstanding: a solid contribution to the necessary rewriting of nineteenth-century cultural history." This expanded edition includes new material on how this important study started with, D. Phil work on the Barry Ono Collection; existing non-academic collectors and enthusiasts (Lawson, Algar, Jay, Medcraft, Summers); theatrical artistes (Barry Ono, Frank Pettingell); research on 'Old Boys blood and thunder' serials (E.S. Turner), early academic studies of popular fiction and its audience; literary studies (J.M.S. Tompkins, Margaret Dalziel); readership (Richard Altick, Raymond Williams); social issues (Q.D. Leavis, Richard Hoggart). The author has also added a short epilogue on other work in the field by radical historians, including E.P. Thompson, Ian Haywood, and Rohan McWilliam. On working-class readership (by David Vincent); on serial fiction and popular traditions, journalism, melodrama and the visual arts; and on recent studies of Edward Lloyd, J.M. Rymer, G.W.M. Reynolds; reprinted fiction by Valancourt et al. He has added a guide to relevant websites for ongoing study.

This work offers a wonderfully illustrated guide – and a rigorous analysis - of popular print and literature in all its many forms in the first half of the 19th century.It provides a unique collection of illustrated popular literature published between the events of ‘Peterloo’ in 1819 and the Great Exhibition of 1851, much never reprinted before. This was a time when the expansive growth of literacy led to the rapid and diverse evolution of popular culture, of publishing and print. This did much to transform the life experiences of millions. The printing press, combined with the railways and the telegraph, was a key agent of mass change.Louis James gives a picture of what the working classes were reading and a fascinating insight into their interest and concerns – their sports, work, crime, politics, religion and entertainments. His detailed introduction places all of this in its context of the contemporary cultural and social movements.The book profusely illustrates the fare which was offered: woodcut pictures, broadsheets and ballads, sensational Gothic novels issued in parts, newspapers and magazines, melodramatic penny dreadfuls published weekly in parts, and tracts of all kinds.The work examines this material in its many aspects, and from both sides of the social mirror. As well as showing the material, and analysing its significance, the book deals with official attempts to damp down or suppress the revolutionary new political and cultural press which served the new literacy. This did much to change taste, and ways of thinking and feeling.  The book brings thus not only brings together a great deal of unusual and otherwise inaccessible illustration, it also offers a multi-facetted discussion of how the material was received, and its longer-term cultural influences.The new edition also includes a survey of studies in popular culture including song (A.L. Lloyd); the popular arts (Barbara Jones, Marx and Lambert, Panofsky, Gombrich); cartoons and graphic satire (Meisel, Maidment); the conventions and influence of popular melodrama and woodcuts, and a case study of the fiction of G.W.M. Reynolds. Also, a list of relevant web sites.