Public credit was controversial in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century England. It entailed new ways of thinking about the individual in relation to the State and was for many reasons a site of cultural negotiation and debate. At the same time, it required commitment from participants in order to function. Some of the debates relating to public credit, whose success was tied up in the way it was represented, find their way into contemporary fiction – in particular the eighteenth-century no...

The Politics of Disinterestedness in Nineteenth-Century Literature historicizes the concept of disinterestedness by examining discourses on political economy during and before the 19th century. It argues that certain literary texts respond to the way all interests are transformed into economic interests during this period. It also shows that this has implications for aesthetics and questions of aesthetic autonomy, in which discourses on disinterestedness are tied up.Throug...

This collection of essays examines the way psychoactive substances are described and discussed within late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British literary and cultural texts. Covering several genres, such as novels, poetry, autobiography and non-fiction, individual essays provide insights on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century understandings of drug effects of opium, alcohol and many other plant-based substances. Contributors consider both contemporary and recent medical knowledge in or...