AustLit

'This article considers some colonial responses to the wider field of ‘British’ Victorian literary reading by following the reading traces left in the diaries of three middle-class women in Melbourne in the 1860s, 70s and 80s: Henrietta Jennings (1887–89), Thomas Anne Cole (1867–82) and Joyce Sincock (1862). Cole’s and Jennings’ diaries offer the most detail but, for both, the record of reading tends to be random, partial and sometimes illegible. Sincock’s diary is brief, and more youthful. It offers a slice of one moment in her life, with considerable detail about some of her reading at that moment. Jennings’ and Cole’s’ diaries map regular visits to town. Jennings visits circulating libraries in Melbourne, such as ‘Mullen’s Select Library’ in Bourke Street, to acquire the latest novels and, as Cole’s early diaries show similar fashionable reading, it is likely she borrowed, or possibly bought, from the same sources. All three diaries reveal wider patterns of reading across a range of genres (and sources), particularly Cole and Jennings; newspaper reading, which may have included the reading of local, as well as British, serial fiction alongside attention to ‘serious’ news items. The reading which Jennings records is eclectic, in terms of genre, and international-Anglophone, including a substantial amount of American writing as well as British and Australian. The reading of Cole, in her early records, tends more to British writing, and travel writing while Sincock reads whatever she can get. All three women also engage in religious reading; the Bible and sermons, but also a variety of other works that might be designated spiritual.' (Author's introduction)

'Why do men continue to fight in wartime? A recent book by Alexander Watson investigates psychological resilience in the British and German armies during the First World War. While much has been made of men who could not cope with the pressures of war and suffered nervous collapse, he argues little study has been made of the vast majority who were able to endure the horrors of trench warfare (5). Watson does not look specifically at the role of the imagination or the intellect in explaining the psychological resilience of British soldiers; rather, he looks to factors such as effective battalion or regimental cohesion, religion and faith, good leadership and support from the home front. This article broadens out the frame of Watson’s analysis by considering the ways in which soldiers engaged intellectually, imaginatively and creatively with the world of print. Such an approach provides deeper understandings of individual responses to war and argues for the importance of acknowledging the intellect and imagination within a strategy of endurance.' (Author's introduction)

'Reading is both a solitary and a social activity. The act of reading itself can be conducted silently or aloud, alone or shared with others. But we also talk about reading with other people through book clubs, casual conversations, media programs and by generating readers’ reviews in online spaces. The introduction of paperbacks made reading more portable and more affordable, and broadened the circulation of texts. More recently, the introduction of electronic reading devices has brought other changes to the social dimension of books and reading. Discussing the technology-driven transition that reading and publishing are now said to be experiencing, Alberto Manguel, an ambassador for the book, recalls seeing a stranger reading a favourite book of his and identifies this moment of recognising a fellow reader as an increasingly endangered experience...' (From author's introduction)