Reading in History

A collection of essays that offer a methodological framework for the history of reading. Focusing on a specific historical moment, it gathers statistics about such issues as literacy rates, library subscriptions, publication and sales figures, and print runs to answer questions about what was being read and by whom in a particular place and time. Introduction, Bonnie Gunzenhauser; Chapter 1 On the Use of Anecdotal Evidence in Reception Study and the History of Reading, Daniel Allington; Chapter 2 Examining the Evidence of Reading: Three Examples from the Reading Experience Database, 1450-1945, Rosalind Crone, Katie Halsey, Shafquat Towheed; Chapter 3 Historical Dictionaries and the History of Reading, Michael Adams; Chapter 4 Reading and the Visual Dimensions of the Book: The Popular Cold War Fictions of Helen Macinnes, Nicole Matthews; Chapter 5 The Work of Abridgements: Readers, Editors and Expectations, Jennifer Snead; Chapter 6 Women Reading Shakespeare in the Outpost: Rural Reading Groups, Literary Culture and Civic Life in America, Katherine Scheil; Chapter 7 Turning Libraries into Public Works: Funding Arguments on the Local Level in Wilkes-Barre and Scranton, Pennsylvania, Catherine Turner; Chapter 8 Explicating Explications: Researching Contemporary Reading, Anouk Lang;