Reading the Great War: An Examination of Edith Wharton’s Reading and Responses, 1914–1918
- Submitting institution
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The Open University
- Unit of assessment
- 27 - English Language and Literature
- Output identifier
- 1451205
- Type
- C - Chapter in book
- DOI
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- Book title
- Reading and the First World War: Readers, Texts, Archives
- Publisher
- Palgrave Macmillan
- ISBN
- 9781137302717
- Open access status
- -
- Month of publication
- August
- Year of publication
- 2015
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- Reading and the First World War is the first publication focussed specifically on this topic; building upon many years of expertise as a historian of reading, Towheed was instrumental in its conception, organisation and publication. The 12 chapter authors based in 6 different countries drew extensively upon unpublished material in archives in over a dozen countries to engage with some of the wider issues and problems of recovering, interpreting, narrating, and representing the evidence and experience of readers and reading communities in the First World War. The volume’s geographical reach spreads from Germany to Australia, and from Italy to the USA, encompassing civilian readers in occupied Belgium and conscientious objectors in British prisons. Towheed co-authored (50%) the introduction (10,135 words), co-edited (50%) of the volume (95,406 words), and was sole author (100%) of the chapter, ‘Reading the Great War: An Examination of Edith Wharton’s Reading and Responses, 1914-1918’ (6800 words), which is based on extensive research of unpublished material conducted in the Edith Wharton archive in the Beinecke Library, Yale University. Reading and the First World War has sold 1600 copies (print and eBook) and been purchased by over 155 libraries in 20 countries. It has been extensively reviewed (Modernism/Modernity; Variants; First World War Studies; English Literature in Transition; SHARP News) with reviewers consistent in their praise of the interdisciplinary approach: ‘inquiries into the practice of reading and into the cultural, social and literary history of First World War form a particularly productive partnership when combined. This edited collection is excellent proof of the validity of their approach’ (Anne Marie-Einhaus, Variants, 2019). It was one of the launch volumes for the New Directions in Book History series with Palgrave Macmillan (Towheed is co-editor of the series) which has now published 34 titles and has cumulative sales of over 60,000 copies.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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