ISBN:
9781439906699
,
1439906696
Language:
English
Pages:
1 online resource (ix, 250 pages)
Parallel Title:
Print version: Blair, Amy L., 1972- Reading up.
DDC:
306.4/88097309041
Keywords:
Mabie, Hamilton Wright, Knowledge
;
Literature.
;
Mabie, Hamilton Wright,
;
Umschulungswerkstätten für Siedler und Auswanderer
;
Ladies' home journal.
;
1900-1999
;
American literature Appreciation 20th century.
;
History
;
Popular literature History and criticism.
;
Books and reading History 20th century.
;
Middle class Books and reading 20th century.
;
History
;
Success in literature.
;
Literature and society History 20th century.
;
Littérature américaine Appréciation 20e siècle.
;
Histoire
;
Paralittérature Histoire et critique.
;
Succès dans la littérature.
;
Littérature et société Histoire 20e siècle.
;
POLITICAL SCIENCE Public Policy
;
Cultural Policy.
;
SOCIAL SCIENCE Anthropology
;
Cultural.
;
SOCIAL SCIENCE Popular Culture.
;
LITERARY CRITICISM American
;
General.
;
American literature Appreciation
;
Literature
;
Books and reading
;
Literature and society
;
Middle class Books and reading
;
Popular literature
;
Success in literature
;
Englisch
;
Leser
;
Literatur
;
Leserin
;
Bestseller
;
United States
;
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
;
History
Abstract:
A person who reads a book for self-improvement rather than aesthetic pleasure is 'reading up.' Reading Up is Amy Blair's engaging study of popular literary critics who promoted reading generally and specific books as vehicles for acquiring cultural competence and economic mobility. Combining methodologies from the history of the book and the history of reading, to mass-cultural studies, reader-response criticism, reception studies, and formalist literary analysis, Blair shows how such critics influenced the choices of striving readers and popularized some elite writers. Framed by an analysis of Hamilton Wright Mabie's role promoting the concept of reading up during his ten-year stint as the cultivator of literary taste for the highly popular Ladies' Home Journal, Reading Up reveals how readers flocked to literary works they would be expected to dislike. Blair shows that while readers could be led to certain books by a trusted adviser, they frequently followed their own path in interpreting them in unexpected ways.
Description / Table of Contents:
Introduction: Cultivating taste in a mass-market world -- Mr. Mabie tells what to read -- The compromise of Silas Lapham -- James for the general reader -- Misreading The house of Mirth -- The comforts of romanticism -- Epilogue: Reading up into the twenty-first century.
URL:
http://VH7QX3XE2P.search.serialssolutions.com/?V=1.0&L=VH7QX3XE2P&S=JCs&C=TC0000606636&T=marc&tab=BOOKS
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