Prescription and Reality: Reading Advisers and Reading Practice, 1860-1880

Victorian Americans were serious readers: they expected books to contribute to their moral development. Yet not all the literature the marketplace provided served this purpose. Many readers therefore turned to reading advisers for suggestions about what to read and how to read it. The advice books they wrote, along with diaries and letters, tell us a great deal about Victorian reading practices and about the changing role of books and periodicals in mid-nineteenth-century society.