ABSTRACT
British publishing in the first half of the eighteenth century was generally characterised by growth and prosperity rather than by innovation. There were, however, three significant exceptions to the generally conservative approach of most members of the trade. The first was the development of the novel. The second was the beginnings of leisure publishing for children. The third, which marked a radical departure from previous practices, was in the field of serial publications. Like some of the trade practices which seem to be characteristic of the eighteenth century, however, serial publishing had its origins in the last decades of the previous century. Indeed, one very important group of serials, the newspapers, had existed since before the Civil War.1 The second half of the seventeenth century, however, saw the beginnings of a different kind of serial publication, which was not directly concerned with the reporting of current events. These new serials were of two kinds: publications intended to be published at regular intervals for the foreseeable future, and books published in parts. These two kinds of serial, the magazine and the part book, were both of great importance to the trade in the eighteenth century, for each, in its own way, opened up new areas of the market and provided regular incomes for publishers, booksellers and authors alike.
