Victorian Fiction-
SIR,—Lest any reader, not quite so familiar with the minutiae of nine- teenth century publishing as Mr. Michael Sadleir, should be misled by his review of my Queens of the Circulating Library. may I claim your indulgence for a brief rejoinder ?
The deductions Mr. Sadleir draws from my statement that the price of newly-published novels was forced up to a guinea and a half for the customary three volumes as a result of Scotts popularity are his, not mine. I had no reason to dispute the fact that novels were in anything from one to eight volumes prior to Waverley or that some of Scott's and his contemporaries' three-deckers sold at lower prices. But, as the catalogue to the Exhibition of Victorian Fiction (for which our debt must be acknowledged to Mr. Sadleir) says: "Three volumes had become during the first quarter of the nineteenth century the standard form for fiction publishing," and again, "Most Victorian novels-continued until near the end to be published in three volumes at 31s. 6d.": My remark that "in 1842 Mudie opened his Select Library" leads Mr. Sadfier to imply for me that no lending library existed prior to that date. To me, however, the category " select " is, and was intended by Mr. Mudie to be, different from that of the ordinary run of previous lending libraries, as indeed the whole book shows. Nor need it have been assumed that "opportunity to read any and every three-volume novel kept in Mudie's stock" meant taking out three volumes at a time for the guinea annual subscription. The facsimile labels included in the book's end-papers display the fact that it was Smith's who issued novels "in sets only."
To argue the congruity or incongruity of the three ideas of compila- tion which my critic foists upon me, or about small points he misconstrues, will perhaps now seem unnecessary: Even supposing a giggle were pro- moted by the admittedly period illustrations, is that unpardonable on
these preserves ? As for "devising a catch-penny title," I would respectfully direct the author of Fanny by Gaslight to my introductory remarks on that lady novelist from whose contemporary reviewer's tribute the title4hrase was taken.—Yours faithfully, ALAN WALBANK.
Kelmscott, Meadowbrook Close, Norwich.
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