Reviews and Comments on A Companion to the Victorian Novel
'[T]here are some real gems here. Graham Law's previously mentioned "Periodicals and Syndication" and Peter L. Shillingsburg's "Book Publishing and the Victorian Literary Marketplace" provide succinct introductions to nineteenth-century print culture, establishing its importance in the Victorian world view. Between them, these articles synthesize the classic works on nineteenth-century publishing history -- from Altick to Cross to Sutherland to Wolff -- and together they provide one of the clearest brief overviews of the field that I have encountered. Law's article would work well as standard reading for any Victorian literature or history course that makes even occasional use of periodicals.'
  Solveig C. Robinson, Pacific Lutheran University

  Review in Victorian Periodicals Review 36:3 (Fall 2003)
  Lyn Pykett, University of Wales, Aberystwyth
  Review in Wilkie Collins Society Journal, NS 6 (2003)
  Sally Mitchell, Temple University
  'The Making of Many Companions', Review in English Literature in Transition, 1880-1920, 46:4 (2003)
'In the Cambridge volume, the handbook function is best served by Simon Eliot's "The Business of Victorian Publishing", a compact survey of the various formats of fiction production from the first Sir Walter (Scott) to the second (Besant). Likewise, two chapters in the Greenwood volume: Graham Law's "Periodicals and Syndication" briskly traces the movement from monthly to weekly partial publication of fiction to the introduction in the 1870s of newspaper syndication by Tillotson's Fiction Bureau; Peter Shillingsburg distills his impressive knowledge of the economics, sociology, and technology of Paternoster Row in "Book Publication and the Victorian Literary Market Place."'
  Robert A. Colby, Professor Emeritus, Queen's College, CUNY
  Review, with The Cambridge Companion to the Victorian Novel, in Studies in the Novel 10 (December 2003)

'This procedure is fine when historical information is intrinsic to the offered subject matter: thus, for example, Jonathan Rose on the Victorian reading revolution in "Education, Literacy, and the Victorian Reader" (Blackwell) and Graham Law on "Periodicals and Syndication" (Greenwood) are admirably helpful. The information in such cases is clearly offered, prior to its potential use in terms of literary interpretation.'
  Phillip Davis, University of Liverpool
  Review, with A Companion to the Victorian Novel (Blackwell), in Victorian Studies 46.4 (2004)


Copyright (C) Graham Law, 2003. All rights reserved.
First drafted Sat 25 October 2003.
Last revised Sun 6 November 2005.