Review of A History of the Book in Australia 1891-1945: A National Culture in a Colonised Market, edited by Martyn Lyons and John Arnold

Abstract

Literary studies have changed, as readers of this review will know well. They are increasingly concerned with context, one example being the acknowledgment that an understanding of book production and distribution and of reading practices is within the legitimate boundaries for literary studies. The successful annual conferences of SHARP (the Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing), for instance, bear testimony to the accommodation of these concerns into mainstream literary studies. Australian literary studies have not been exempt from this concern; on the contrary, some of its practitioners (most notably Wallace Kirsop) have been instrumental in developing the field internationally. The History of the Book in Australia (HOBA) project is one element in an international movement of national histories of the book, sometimes called histories of print culture.