Music Hall and Modernity

The Late-Victorian Discovery of Popular Culture

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, British
Cover of the book Music Hall and Modernity by Barry J. Faulk, Ohio University Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Barry J. Faulk ISBN: 9780821441398
Publisher: Ohio University Press Publication: October 1, 2004
Imprint: Ohio University Press Language: English
Author: Barry J. Faulk
ISBN: 9780821441398
Publisher: Ohio University Press
Publication: October 1, 2004
Imprint: Ohio University Press
Language: English

The late-Victorian discovery of the music hall by English intellectuals marks a crucial moment in the history of popular culture. Music Hall and Modernity demonstrates how such pioneering cultural critics as Arthur Symons and Elizabeth Robins Pennell used the music hall to secure and promote their professional identity as guardians of taste and national welfare. These social arbiters were, at the same time, devotees of the spontaneous culture of “the people.”

In examining fiction from Walter Besant, Hall Caine, and Henry Nevinson, performance criticism from William Archer and Max Beerbohm, and late-Victorian controversies over philanthropy and moral reform, scholar Barry Faulk argues that discourse on music-hall entertainment helped consolidate the identity and tastes of an emergent professional class. Critics and writers legitimized and cleaned up the music hall, at the same time allowing issues of class, respect, and empowerment to be negotiated.

Music Hall and Modernity offers a complex view of the new middle-class, middlebrow mass culture of late-Victorian London and contributes to a body of scholarship on nineteenth-century urbanism. The book will also interest scholars concerned with the emergence of a professional managerial class and the genealogy of cultural studies.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

The late-Victorian discovery of the music hall by English intellectuals marks a crucial moment in the history of popular culture. Music Hall and Modernity demonstrates how such pioneering cultural critics as Arthur Symons and Elizabeth Robins Pennell used the music hall to secure and promote their professional identity as guardians of taste and national welfare. These social arbiters were, at the same time, devotees of the spontaneous culture of “the people.”

In examining fiction from Walter Besant, Hall Caine, and Henry Nevinson, performance criticism from William Archer and Max Beerbohm, and late-Victorian controversies over philanthropy and moral reform, scholar Barry Faulk argues that discourse on music-hall entertainment helped consolidate the identity and tastes of an emergent professional class. Critics and writers legitimized and cleaned up the music hall, at the same time allowing issues of class, respect, and empowerment to be negotiated.

Music Hall and Modernity offers a complex view of the new middle-class, middlebrow mass culture of late-Victorian London and contributes to a body of scholarship on nineteenth-century urbanism. The book will also interest scholars concerned with the emergence of a professional managerial class and the genealogy of cultural studies.

More books from Ohio University Press

Cover of the book The Tenets of Cognitive Existentialism by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Count the Wings by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Apocalypse, Darling by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Violence by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book A Theology of Sense by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Out of Step by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Pursuing Justice in Africa by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Pachakutik and the Rise and Decline of the Ecuadorian Indigenous Movement by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Passionate Revolutions by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book The Birth of Sense by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Female Piety and the Invention of American Puritanism by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Permissible Narratives by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Making Modern Girls by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book A Passion for Specificity by Barry J. Faulk
Cover of the book Slavery and Reform in West Africa by Barry J. Faulk
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy