Introduction The Nineteenth-Century Popular Press and Shakespeare Reception History

In the nineteenth century, technological advances in printing combined with increasing literacy rates in Britain to make periodicals and newspapers an important medium for Shakespeare’s unprecedented popularisation beyond the upper echelons of British society. Within this popular press is the highly detailed, unmediated record of popular Shakespeare reception, intact and uncorrupted by secondary interpretation. Though hitherto largely ignored in Shakespeare reception histories, even those focusing on popular culture, the periodicals offer an alternative to the usual teleological method of narrating reception history, recording Victorian Shakespeare reception as it was experienced by its first readers.