A History of the Novel in Britain

By Philip Hensher

"A wonderful read. . . . A] masterpiece."--Kathryn Hughes, The Guardian

From the Booker Prize-shortlisted author of The Northern Clemency, an enlightening and entertaining history of the British novel from the eighteenth century to today

This illuminating new history of the novel as both an art and an industry begins in the eighteenth century, when people began to read in ever greater numbers, seeking words that helped explain their hopes and desires. As acclaimed novelist and critic Philip Hensher explains, a new kind of literature was needed for this growing market of readers, one that reflected as many different lives in its pages as there were people to buy them, that could change with the times and do something new: something novel.

Hensher describes how the evolutionary scramble by writers and publishers to get attention drove constant innovation in writing techniques, and produced new ways of printing, distributing, and selling books. Over the course of three hundred years, from the novel's rise in the eighteenth century to the present, from Daniel Defoe to Zadie Smith, these forces shaped the novel's form and its future.

Combining wit and authority, Hensher reads widely across the famous, the once famous, and the utterly (if unfairly) forgotten, making a serious case for widening the canon as he celebrates the British novel in all its peculiar and beguiling incarnations. The result promises to inspire readers to seek out novels they have never opened--or perhaps even heard of--as well as to rediscover forgotten favorites.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691302650
• ISBN13: 9780691302652
• Release Date: February 2027
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 704 Pages