"The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period" by W. St. Clair

It is not a simple read, if one were to define a text by its mere volume. And at 765 pages, its a monster of a book. But even if you were to remove the hefty appendices, the breadth of research still comes to the fore with a fluid hand. "The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period" identifies a time of transition, between the mid-18th century, and that of the early to mid-19th century and how this would define not only a nation but the printing strategies and cultural, societal milieu to come. Not a simple book indeed.

The book industry was, for so long, a patronage/cartel run business for much of its early stages. "The romantic period was to see the last sustained attempt by the British state to control the minds of the British people by controlling the print to which they had access." In the manuscript age, where texts were manually produced, church and government had control, in terms of content, and to some extent distribution, and price. The print age created a strong tie with state and business. "Only those members of the [book] industry who were sworn members of the official English church, and whose loyalty to the state was unquestioned, were permitted to" engage in the industry. The steps to modern publishing, and intellectual property rights began, in essence, with the abolition of state censorship in 1695. From there it was still a troublesome path.

Once the church and state broke ties with the book industry it "was now effected by the weight, [and] price". Further "the industry, by building up vested interests in the supply of certain favoured titles, and by its constant awareness of the need to maintain the share price of these properties by rationing the supply, encouraged a tendency towards cultural as well as towards technological obsolescence." The industry, by its control and greed, froze a nation. This lasted for nearly a century, at least up to 1774 when further legislation was enacted; meanwhile other nations developed new printing technologies, and authors were less taxed or at least could be published in another country. This is perhaps the most troublesome discovery of St. Clair's book. In effect, "the losses", by limiting the variety of texts, and propping up the prices so only the higher echelons of society had access, manifested "less literature of all kinds being written and published, less reprinting, less reading, a slow-down in the pace of the diffusion of new ideas, less access to the discoveries of science and medicine by those at the lower tranches [levels] of the book market, less education, more obsolete education, more illiteracy, more ignorance, more unwanted children."

The relationship between author and publisher would evolve. But by looking back at the actually production numbers of books, one can gain a clear impression of the state of the author in his or her time, rather than rely on 21st century historians interpreting "the classics" [by the way, this term originated as a framework of considerate, tender titles and texts suitable for cultured women to read, not the anthological listing of our impressing of literary giants]. For St. Clair access the actual production numbers of works of Shelley, Byron, Wordsworth, Austen and such reveal that Sir Walter Scott "whose verse works were sold in the largest numbers." Shelley, Keats and company, works we now think of a canonical, actually had less of a societal impact when published.

Meanwhile, the United States were only mildly scorched by the brutal heat of the British system of industrial monopoly. Their production was wider [more titles] and less skewed toward aristocracy. A reading populace is an educated populace. "The post-independence intellectual property regime helped the United States to become one of the most modern countries in the world."

In all "The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period" is full of discovery and thought. How the book industry affects a nation is often only brushed over. St. Clair anchors this idea with multitude of facts, not anecdotal quips. If you want to bite into something a little more textually and intellectually engaging, and had a sense of history with a purpose, this not-so little volume would be fulfilling.
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