Culture, Literature, and the Arts

Long Nineteenth Century

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Essays

  • Authorship

    Joanne Shattock Centre for Victorian Studies, University of Leicester This essay analyses the conflicted notion of authorship and traces the changes in literary life throughout the nineteenth century. It argues…

  • British Theatre in the Nineteenth Century

    Katherine Newey University of Exeter The nineteenth century was a theatrical century. It may not have been a century of great dramatic writing by conventional literary standards, but it was…

  • British Travel Writing, 1770–1914

    Tim Youngs Department of English, Linguistics and Philosophy, Nottingham Trent University This essay outlines some of the features and shifts in British travel writing from 1770–1914. It considers the impact…

  • Illustration

    Julia Thomas Cardiff University, Wales This essay provides an overview of the development of illustration – the pictures that accompanied words on the printed page – into a dominant mode…

  • Life Writing

    Valerie Sanders School of Humanities, University of Hull Life writing flourished in the nineteenth century. Defined here as a personal narrative that meaningfully recounts the events and experiences of an…

  • Nineteenth-Century Mediamorphosis: Transformations in Print Culture

    Andrew King Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Greenwich, London Mediamorphosis – transformation in the organisation of the media – defines who we are, what we can communicate and to…

  • Popular Culture in Nineteenth-Century Britain

    Brian Maidment Liverpool John Moores University The vast stream of cheap mass circulation print that flowed through nineteenth-century Britain – penny issue fiction, religious tracts, magazines, sheet music, and almanacs…

  • Race and Theatre in Nineteenth-Century Britain

    Sarah Meer Faculty of English, University of Cambridge The early nineteenth century was a formative time for the construction and establishment of racial thinking. Theatre and performance played a crucial…

  • Readers and the Reading Public

    Beth Palmer School of Literature and Languages, University of Surrey This essay contextualises the broad increase in literacy and readership across the nineteenth century by considering the changes in educational…

  • Theoretical Approaches to the Reception of Popular Forms of Entertainment and Visual Culture

    Patricia Smyth Theatre and Performance Department, University of Warwick This essay explores theoretical approaches to popular reception, drawing on discussions in the fields of theatre history, art history, and the…

  • Women and Art

    Patricia Zakreski Department of English and Creative Writing, University of Exeter This essay traces the social and institutional barriers women artists encountered in the Victorian art world, detailing the challenges…

  • Women and Genre

    Joanne Wilkes University of Auckland, New Zealand This essay canvasses women’s practice over the nineteenth century of the three most prominent creative literary genres: fiction, poetry, and drama. It also…

  • Women and Performance in the Nineteenth Century

    Katherine Newey University of Exeter What would a history of nineteenth-century theatre look like if it were focused on the work of women? We know that women have always been…