The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920

The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920 PDF Author: Mary Ann Gillies
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 0802091474
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Breaking new ground in the study of British literary culture during an important, transitional period, this new work by Mary Ann Gillies focuses on the professional literary agent whose emergence in Britain around 1880 coincided with, and accelerated, the transformation of both publishing and authorship. Like other recent studies in book and print culture, The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920 starts from the central premise that the business of authorship is inextricably linked with the aesthetics of literary praxis. Rather than provide a broad overview of the period, however, Gillies focuses on a specific figure, the professional literary agent. She then traces the influence of two prominent agents - A. P. Watt (generally acknowledged as the first professional literary agent) and J. B. Pinker (the leading figure in the second wave of agents) - focusing on their respective relationships with two key clients. The case studies not only provide insight into the business dynamics of the literary world at this time, but also illustrate the shifting definition of literature itself during the period.

The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920

The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920 PDF Author: Mary Ann Gillies
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 0802091474
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Get Book Here

Book Description
Breaking new ground in the study of British literary culture during an important, transitional period, this new work by Mary Ann Gillies focuses on the professional literary agent whose emergence in Britain around 1880 coincided with, and accelerated, the transformation of both publishing and authorship. Like other recent studies in book and print culture, The Professional Literary Agent in Britain, 1880-1920 starts from the central premise that the business of authorship is inextricably linked with the aesthetics of literary praxis. Rather than provide a broad overview of the period, however, Gillies focuses on a specific figure, the professional literary agent. She then traces the influence of two prominent agents - A. P. Watt (generally acknowledged as the first professional literary agent) and J. B. Pinker (the leading figure in the second wave of agents) - focusing on their respective relationships with two key clients. The case studies not only provide insight into the business dynamics of the literary world at this time, but also illustrate the shifting definition of literature itself during the period.

The History of British Women's Writing, 1880-1920

The History of British Women's Writing, 1880-1920 PDF Author: Holly A. Laird
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137393807
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Book Description
The ranks of English women writers rose steeply in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, contributing to the era’s revolutionary social movements as well as to transforming literary genres in prose and poetry. The phenomena of ‘the new’ — ‘New Women’, ‘New Unionism’, ‘New Imperialism’, ‘New Ethics’, ‘New Critics’, ‘New Journalism’, ‘New Man’ — are this moment’s touchstones. This book tracks the period's new social phenomena and unfolds its distinctively modern modes of writing. It provides expert introductions amid new insights into women’s writing throughout the United Kingdom and around the globe.

Art and Commerce in the British Short Story, 1880–1950

Art and Commerce in the British Short Story, 1880–1950 PDF Author: Dean Baldwin
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317321936
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 253

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Book Description
The short story was a commercial phenomenon which took off in the late nineteenth century and lasted through to the rise of television and film. Baldwin uses a wide variety of sources to show how economic factors helped to dictate how and what a wide variety of authors wrote.

Victorian Literary Businesses

Victorian Literary Businesses PDF Author: Marrisa Joseph
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030285928
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 229

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Book Description
This book explores the business practices of the British publishing industry from 1843-1900, discussing the role of creative businesses in society and the close relationship between culture and business in a historical context. Marrisa Joseph develops a strong cultural, social and historical discussion around the developments in copyright law, gender and literary culture from a management perspective; analysing how individuals formed professional associations and contract law to instigate new processes. Drawing on institutional theory and analysing primary and archival sources, this book traces how the practices of literary businesses developed, reproduced and later legitimised. By offering a close analysis of some of publishing’s most influential businesses, it provides an insight into the decision-making processes that shaped an industry and brings to the fore the ‘institutional story’ surrounding literary business and their practices, many of which can still be seen today.

Literary Agents in the Transatlantic Book Trade

Literary Agents in the Transatlantic Book Trade PDF Author: Cécile Cottenet
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317192877
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
By way of a case study of one of the oldest French book agencies, Agence Hoffman, this book analyzes the role played by French literary agents in the importation of US fiction and literature into France in the years following World War II. It sheds light on the material conditions of the circulation of texts across the Atlantic between 1944 and 1955, exploring the fine mechanisms of agents’ negotiations which allowed texts, and ideas, to cross borders. While providing comparative insights into the history of publishing in France and in the United States in the immediate aftermath of the war, this book aims at foregrounding the role of the book agent, an all-too often neglected intermediary in the field of book history. Grounded in archival work conducted both in France and the United States, this study is based on previously unexamined correspondence. Considering the concept of mediation as central in the field of print culture, this book addresses the dearth of scholarship on literary agents on both sides of the Atlantic, and intersects with the current scholarship on transatlantic, internationalm and transnational cultural and trade networks, as evidenced by the recently emerged field of sociology of translation in Europe.

Empires of Print

Empires of Print PDF Author: Patrick Scott Belk
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1317185056
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
At the turn of the twentieth century, the publishing industries in Britain and the United States underwent dramatic expansions and reorganization that brought about an increased traffic in books and periodicals around the world. Focusing on adventure fiction published from 1899 to 1919, Patrick Scott Belk looks at authors such as Joseph Conrad, H.G. Wells, Conan Doyle, and John Buchan to explore how writers of popular fiction engaged with foreign markets and readers through periodical publishing. Belk argues that popular fiction, particularly the adventure genre, developed in ways that directly correlate with authors’ experiences, and shows that popular genres of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries emerged as one way of marketing their literary works to expanding audiences of readers worldwide. Despite an over-determined print space altered by the rise of new kinds of consumers and transformations of accepted habits of reading, publishing, and writing, the changes in British and American publishing at the turn of the twentieth century inspired an exciting new period of literary invention and experimentation in the adventure genre, and the greater part of that invention and experimentation was happening in the magazines. ​

Merchants of Culture

Merchants of Culture PDF Author: John B. Thompson
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745647863
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 441

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Book Description
In this book the first major study of trade publishing for more than thirty years - Thompson situates the current challenges facing the industry in a historical context, analysing the transformation of trade publishing in the United States and Britain since the 1960's. He gives a detailed account of how the world of trade publishing really works, dissecting the roles of publishers, agents and booksellers and showing how their practices are shaped by a field that has a distinctive structure and dynamic. By reconstructing this dynamic he is able to shed fresh light on how bestsellers are made and on why many thousands of books and authors find themselves marooned in an industry increasingly focused on short-term growth and profitability. Against this backcloth Thompson analyses the impact of the digital revolution on book publishing and examines the pressures both economic and technological that are re-shaping the field of trade publishing today.

Margaret Atwood and the Labour of Literary Celebrity

Margaret Atwood and the Labour of Literary Celebrity PDF Author: Lorraine York
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
ISBN: 1442664940
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
For every famous author there is a score of individuals working behind the scenes to promote and maintain her celebrity status. This timely and thoughtful book considers the particular case of internationally renowned writer Margaret Atwood and the active agents working in concert with her, including her assistants and office staff, her publicists, her literary agents, and her editors. Lorraine York explores the ways in which the careers of famous writers are managed and maintained and the extent to which literary celebrity creates a constant tension in these writers’ lives between the need of solitude for creative purposes and the give-and-take of the business of being a writer of significant public stature. Making extensive use of unpublished material in the Margaret Atwood Papers at the University of Toronto, York demonstrates the extent to which celebrity writers must embrace and protect themselves from the demands of the literary world, including by participating in – or even inventing – new forms of technology that facilitate communication from a slight remove. This informative study calls overdue attention to the ways in which literary celebrity is the result not only of a writer’s creativity and hard work, but also of an ongoing collaborative effort among professionals to help maintain the writer’s place in the public eye.

New Grub Street

New Grub Street PDF Author: George Gissing
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198729189
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
New Grub Street (1891), generally regarded as Gissing's finest novel, is the story of the daily lives and broken dreams of men and women forced to earn a living by the pen. It tells of a group of novelists, journalists, and scholars caught in the literary and cultural crisis that hit Britain in the closing years of the nineteenth century.

The Book in Britain

The Book in Britain PDF Author: Daniel Allington
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 1119115167
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 568

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Book Description
Introduces readers to the history of books in Britain—their significance, influence, and current and future status Presented as a comprehensive, up-to-date narrative, The Book in Britain: A Historical Introduction explores the impact of books, manuscripts, and other kinds of material texts on the cultures and societies of the British Isles. The text clearly explains the technicalities of printing and publishing and discusses the formal elements of books and manuscripts, which are necessary to facilitate an understanding of that impact. This collaboratively authored narrative history combines the knowledge and expertise of five scholars who seek to answer questions such as: How does the material form of a text affect its meaning? How do books shape political and religious movements? How have the economics of the book trade and copyright shaped the literary canon? Who has been included in and excluded from the world of books, and why? The Book in Britain: A Historical Introduction will appeal to all scholars, students, and historians interested in the written word and its continued production and presentation.