| Description |
1 online resource (164 pages) : illustrations |
| Contents |
Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- Preface -- Chapter One. The Dawning Age of Sensation -- Chapter Two. Deadly Encounters -- Chapter Three. The Press Responds -- Chapter Four. From Fact to Fiction -- Chapter Five. The Novel Experience -- Bibliographical Note -- Index |
| Summary |
In July 1861 London newspapers excitedly reported two violent crimes, both the stuff of sensational fiction. One involved a retired army major, his beautiful mistress and her illegitimate child, blackmail and murder. In the other, a French nobleman was accused of trying to kill his son in order to claim the young man's inheritance. The press covered both cases with thoroughness and enthusiasm, narrating events in a style worthy of a popular novelist, and including lengthy passages of testimony. Not only did they report rumor as well as what seemed to be fact, they speculated about the credibility of witnesses, assessed character, and decided guilt. The public was enthralled.Richard D. Altick demonstrates that these two cases, as they were presented in the British press, set the tone for the Victorian "age of sensation." The fascination with crime, passion, and suspense has a long history, but it was in the 1860s that this fascination became the vogue in England. Altick shows that these crimes provided literary prototypes and authenticated extraordinary passion and incident in fiction with the "shock of actuality." While most sensational melodramas and novels were by lesser writers, authors of the stature of Dickens, Thackeray, George Eliot, Trollope, Hardy, and Wilkie Collins were also influenced by the spirit of the age and incorporated sensational elements in their work |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 159-160) and index |
| Notes |
Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002. http://purl.oclc.org/DLF/benchrepro0212 MiAaHDL |
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digitized 2010 HathiTrust Digital Library committed to preserve pda MiAaHDL |
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Print version record |
| Subject |
Murder -- England -- London -- History -- 19th century -- Case studies
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Crime and the press -- England -- London -- History -- 19th century -- Case studies
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Crime and the press.
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Murder.
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Mord
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Presse
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Massenmedien
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Berichterstattung
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England -- London.
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London
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Großbritannien
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| Genre/Form |
Case studies.
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History.
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| LC no. |
86001511 |
| ISBN |
9780812208481 |
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081220848X |
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