Dickens' Fur Coat and Charlotte's Unanswered Letters: The Rows and Romances of England's Great Victorian Novelists

""Letting booksellers set prices... just allowed big booksellers to drive the `independents' out of business by underselling them.... it would destroy the country's intellectual life."" A reflection on today's David and Goliath bookselling battles? No--Alexander Macmillan's reflections on England's 1852 discount controversy, just one of the many resonant and entertaining tales to be found in this book on the business of writing, publishing and bookselling in the Victorian age. The book's gimmicky title belies the author's intelligent telling of the transformation and maturation of the industry. The Victorian Greats are brought to life, their motivations and vulnerabilities revealed through their own letters, which Pool (What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew) expertly weaves into a lively dramatic narrative. While Dickens, Bronte, Thackeray and George Eliot chronicled the social condition of the time, industry innovators like W.H. Smith, who dispensed ""portable books"" at the first railroad station book stall, and Charles Mudie, whose circulating libraries commanded great power, stimulated the mass production of books and fostered widespread literacy throughout the country. Though Pool's occasionally convoluted prose could use the kind of editor saluted in its pages, this book tells the colorful stories behind the creators and the creation of the voluminous Victorian novels. Anglophiles and bibliophiles alike will relish this celebration of the rich and glorious history of publishing and bookselling. Photos. (May)