Literary Publishing in America, 1790-1850
Paperback
Release Date:05 Mar 1993
ISBN:9780870238017
Literary Publishing in America, 1790-1850
By William Charvat; Afterword by Michael Winship
University of Massachusetts Press
Available for the first time in paperback, this book is a succinct distillation of the work and thought of William Charvat, a pioneer in the study of the history of the American book. This burgeoning field of inquiry investigates the social and cultural context of the act of literary creation by relating it to the modes of its production and distribution. This new edition of Literary Publishing in America contains an afterword by Michael Winship that discusses scholarship in the field since publication of Charvat's groundbreaking work.
A classic study of the antebellum publishing scene. . . the only study of its kind. . . . More and more scholars today are interested in the kinds of issues - book production, distribution, publishing geography - that Charvat was the first to deal with in a responsible way.'—David S. Reynolds, author of Beneath the American Renaissance: The Subversive Imagination in the Age of Emerson and Melville
'A cogent, persuasive, and interesting analysis of the mainsprings of American publishing during the formative years.'—New England Quarterly
'Anyone who works on the history of writers and writing in the ninteenth century owes a particularly large debt to . . . Charvat's books and essays, and especially his Literary Publishing in America. . . . [These works] are the points of entry to the field.'—R. Jackson Wilson, in Figures of Speech: American Writers and the Literary Marketplace from Benjamin Franklin to Emily Dickinson
The late William Charvat was professor of English at Ohio State University and a general editor of The Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Associate professor of English at the University of Texas, Michael Winship is editor of Bibliography of American Literature.
