Distributed for University of London Press
Books, Readers and Libraries in Fiction
A chronological account of the depiction of books, libraries, and reading in fiction from the medieval period to the present.
Books and libraries appear in fiction from the earliest times onwards, in works for all age groups, in canonical literature, and in books that form part of popular culture. Fiction enables writers to teach readers how to read, but it can also portray subversive acts of reading that engage with contemporary cultural anxieties or moral debates. The reading material of fictional personae is part of their characterization; we are often reading readers.
Drawing on approaches from literary studies, book history, library history, and theories and histories of reading, Books, Readers and Libraries in Fiction examines what fictional representations of reading tell us about changing cultural attitudes to different reading practices, and the use (and abuse) of books beyond actual reading, both in the context of specific works and about the reception of books more widely. Through detailed case studies from primarily British fiction that address common themes such as gender, genre, and the relation between reading and writing itself, this collection catalogs the ways in which authors of fiction mediate and interpret books, libraries, and the act of reading to their own readers.
Books and libraries appear in fiction from the earliest times onwards, in works for all age groups, in canonical literature, and in books that form part of popular culture. Fiction enables writers to teach readers how to read, but it can also portray subversive acts of reading that engage with contemporary cultural anxieties or moral debates. The reading material of fictional personae is part of their characterization; we are often reading readers.
Drawing on approaches from literary studies, book history, library history, and theories and histories of reading, Books, Readers and Libraries in Fiction examines what fictional representations of reading tell us about changing cultural attitudes to different reading practices, and the use (and abuse) of books beyond actual reading, both in the context of specific works and about the reception of books more widely. Through detailed case studies from primarily British fiction that address common themes such as gender, genre, and the relation between reading and writing itself, this collection catalogs the ways in which authors of fiction mediate and interpret books, libraries, and the act of reading to their own readers.
262 pages | 4 halftones, 3 line drawings and 1 table | 6.14 x 9.21 | © 2025
Literature and Literary Criticism: General Criticism and Critical Theory
Table of Contents
Introduction: Books, Reading, and Libraries in Fiction
Karen Attar and Andrew Nash
1 Reading Envisioned in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries
Daniel Sawyer
2 ‘The Gay Part of Reading’: Corruption through Reading?
Rahel Orgis
3 ‘Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet’: Reading Fiction Together in the Eighteenth Century
Abigail Williams
4 Jane Austen’s Refinement of the Intradiegetic Novel Reader in Northanger Abbey: A Study in Ricoeurian Hermeneutics of Recuperation
Monika Class
5 ‘Evaluating Negative Representations of Reading: Ivan Turgenev’s Faust (1855)’
Shafquat Towheed
6 ‘I spent all yesterday trying to read’: Reading in the Face of Existential Threat in Bram Stoker’s Dracula
Hannah Callahan
7 ‘Into separate brochures’: Stitched Work and a New New Testament in Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure
Lucy Sixsmith
8 A Fire Fed on Books: Books and Reading in D.H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers
Susan Watson
9 ‘I sometimes like to read a novel’: Books and Reading in Victorian Adventure Romance
Andrew Nash
10 When It Isn’t Cricket: Books, Reading and Libraries in the Girls’ School Story
Karen Attar
11 The Body in the Library in the Fiction of Agatha Christie and her `Golden Age’ Contemporaries
Keith Manley
12 ‘Very Nearly Magical’: Books and their Readers in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Series
Jane Suzanne Carroll
Karen Attar and Andrew Nash
1 Reading Envisioned in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries
Daniel Sawyer
2 ‘The Gay Part of Reading’: Corruption through Reading?
Rahel Orgis
3 ‘Fling Peregrine Pickle under the toilet’: Reading Fiction Together in the Eighteenth Century
Abigail Williams
4 Jane Austen’s Refinement of the Intradiegetic Novel Reader in Northanger Abbey: A Study in Ricoeurian Hermeneutics of Recuperation
Monika Class
5 ‘Evaluating Negative Representations of Reading: Ivan Turgenev’s Faust (1855)’
Shafquat Towheed
6 ‘I spent all yesterday trying to read’: Reading in the Face of Existential Threat in Bram Stoker’s Dracula
Hannah Callahan
7 ‘Into separate brochures’: Stitched Work and a New New Testament in Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure
Lucy Sixsmith
8 A Fire Fed on Books: Books and Reading in D.H. Lawrence’s Sons and Lovers
Susan Watson
9 ‘I sometimes like to read a novel’: Books and Reading in Victorian Adventure Romance
Andrew Nash
10 When It Isn’t Cricket: Books, Reading and Libraries in the Girls’ School Story
Karen Attar
11 The Body in the Library in the Fiction of Agatha Christie and her `Golden Age’ Contemporaries
Keith Manley
12 ‘Very Nearly Magical’: Books and their Readers in Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Series
Jane Suzanne Carroll