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This book is a carefully annotated selection of eighteenth-century writings about popular culture. During the eighteenth century, popular culture assumed a peculiar importance. In the early part of the century, high and low cultures often collided. Later in the century, politeness more and more required the distancing of genteel from vulgar amusements. This collection rediscovers some of the energies of the low and the vulgar in the period by examining particular themes (crime, religious enthusiasm, popular politics, for example) and telling particular stories (the career of a notorious criminal, the exploits of a religious sect, John Wilkes and the crowd). It also illustrates how the very idea of popular culture was formed in the period, providing examples of the ways in which it was discussed both by those who were fearful of it and those who were fascinated by it.
John Mullan is Senior Lecturer in English, University College, London Christopher Reid is Senior Lecturer in English, Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London
Show moreThis book is a carefully annotated selection of eighteenth-century writings about popular culture. During the eighteenth century, popular culture assumed a peculiar importance. In the early part of the century, high and low cultures often collided. Later in the century, politeness more and more required the distancing of genteel from vulgar amusements. This collection rediscovers some of the energies of the low and the vulgar in the period by examining particular themes (crime, religious enthusiasm, popular politics, for example) and telling particular stories (the career of a notorious criminal, the exploits of a religious sect, John Wilkes and the crowd). It also illustrates how the very idea of popular culture was formed in the period, providing examples of the ways in which it was discussed both by those who were fearful of it and those who were fascinated by it.
John Mullan is Senior Lecturer in English, University College, London Christopher Reid is Senior Lecturer in English, Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London
Show moreIntroduction
Using the Selection
1: Eighteenth-Century Views of Popular Culture
2: Religious enthusiasm: the French Prophets, 1707-1711
3: Fairgoers and Reformers: the Struggle for Bartholomew Fair
4: Almanacs: Astrology and Popular Protestantism
5: Crime: the Fortunes of Jack Sheppard
6: Custom and the Calendar: the Gregorian Reform and its
Opponents
7: Popular Politics: John Wilkes and the Crowd, 1768-70
8: Popular Perceptions of Empire: Native Americans in Britain in
the 1760s
Index
John Mullan is Senior Lecturer in English, University College,
London
Christopher Reid is Senior Lecturer in English, Queen Mary and
Westfield College, University of London
`Any anthology challenges the reader ... But the real interest of
this one, besides its provocative complexity, is the conjunction of
the expected (like the passages on Bartholemew Fair) and the
unexpected.'
Jenny Uglow, TLS, 4 May 2001
`fascinating selection of extracts'
Jenny Uglow, TLS, 4 May 2001
`The collection is packed with good things, and is the more
interesting because of its unusual construction. Instead of
following a thematic or subject approach, the extracts are grouped
around particular historical moments between 1700 and 1780. ... If
at first this feels limiting, it actually opens out each area.'
Jenny Uglow, TLS 4 May 2001
`The ripples of interest spread out beyond and behind the text,
carried on the waves of commentary and annotation and suggestions
for further reading.'
Jenny Uglow, TLS 4 May 2001
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