Common Reading: Critics, Historians, Publics

by Stefan Collini

Overview

In this series of penetrating and attractively readable essays, Stefan Collini explores aspects of the literary and intellectual culture of Britain from the early twentieth century to the present. Collini focuses on critics and historians who wrote for a non-specialist readership, and on the periodicals and other genres through which they attempted to reach that readership.

Among the critics discussed are Cyril Connolly, V.S. Pritchett, Aldous Huxley, Rebecca West, Edmund Wilson, and George Orwell, while the historians include A.L. Rowse, Arthur Bryant, E.H. Carr, and E.P. Thompson. There are also essays on wider themes such as the fate of 'general' periodicals, the history of reading, the role of criticism, changing conceptions of 'culture', the limitations of biography, and the functions of universities. Explicitly addressed to 'the non-specialist reader', these essays make some of the fruits of detailed scholarly research in various fields available to a wider audience in a succinct and elegant manner.

Stefan Collini has been acclaimed as one of the most brilliant essayists of our time, and this collection shows him at his subtle, perceptive, and trenchant best. The book will appeal to (and delight) readers interested in literature, history, and contemporary cultural debate.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780199569793
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	10/25/2009
Pages:	384
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.40(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Stefan Collini is Professor of Intellectual History and English Literature at the University of Cambridge and a Fellow of Clare Hall. A frequent contributor to The Times Literary Supplement, The London Review of Books, and other periodicals both in Britain and the USA, his previous books include Public Moralists (1991), Matthew Arnold: a Critical Portrait (1994, reissued 2007), English Pasts (1999), and Absent Minds: Intellectuals in Britain (2006), all also published by Oxford University Press. He is a Fellow of both the British Academy and the Royal Historical Society.

Table of Contents

Part One: Writing Lives
Chapter 1 On not getting on with it: the criticism of Cyril Connolly
Chapter 2 Rolling it out: V. S. Pritchett's writing life
Chapter 3 The Great Seer: Aldous Huxley's visions
Chapter 4 Performance: the critical authority of Rebecca West
Chapter 5 Man of letters as hero: the energy of Edmund Wilson
Chapter 6 Plain speaking: the lives of George Orwell
Chapter 7 Believing in oneself: the career of Stephen Spender
Chapter 8 Smacking: the letters of William Empson
Chapter 9 Disappointment: A. L. Rowse in his diaries
Chapter 10 Believing in England: Arthur Bryant, historian as man of letters
Chapter 11 Believing in history: Herbert Butterfield, Christian and Whig
Chapter 12 The intellectual as realist: the puzzling career of E. H. Carr
Chapter 13 Enduring passion: E. H. Thompson's reputation
Chapter 14 Olympian universalism: Perry Anderson as essayist
Chapter 15 Hegel in green wellies: Roger Scruton's England

Part Two: Reading Matters
Chapter 16 'The Great Age': the idealizing of Victorian culture
Chapter 17 Always dying: the idea of the general periodical
Chapter 18 Boomster and the Quack: the author as celebrity
Chapter 19 Private reading: the autodidact public
Chapter 20 The completest mode: the literary critic as hero
Chapter 21 From deference to diversity: 'culture' in Britain 1945-2000
Chapter 22 Well connected: biography and intellectual elites
Chapter 23 National lives: The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
Chapter 24 HiEdBiz: universities and their publics

References
Acknowledgements
Index

Editorial Reviews

"Collini is acute, analytical and often killingly funny."—Bevis Hillier, Daily Telegraph

"This collection shows the considerable talents and erudition of one of Britain's finest essayists and writers. Collini is skilled at portraiture His style is capacious, fair minded and unbuttoned, alert to the quirks of personality and the conflicts of creative restlessness."—Ronan McDonald, Times Higher Education Supplement

"Too many histories of literary and intellectual culture are stuck in the elegiac mode. Stefan Collini avoids this trap in this bracing collection. He is one of the finest essayists we have."—Jonathan Derbyshire, Prospect

"Collini's linguistic unpredictability is so refreshing. He fleshes out his thesis with sparkling accounts of distinct epochs."—Eve Patten, Irish Times

From the Publisher