British Aestheticism And The Urban Working Classes, 1870-1900 Book

As the blurb says, this is an important study of an understudied area. The author rightly notes that the history of the book tends to be just that -- history rather than study of anything contemporary. The book itself, however, is lacking in its structure and argument, and so I can't recommend it as more than something one should be aware of.

Specifically, it reads like a poorly-structured dissertation: it begins with a summary-laden literature review as the first part, and overly detailed case studies as the second part. The book would have been far more effective and engaging had these been integrated, and theory brought up (and discussed, not summarized) as required by the topics and the author's argument about each. Note that I said topics rather than cases, because case studies are a terrible way, in general, to structure something. Focusing on the argument, rather than letting the sources determine your structure, is the way to go.

But it makes me wonder, is the book structured this way because it has no real argument? I don't think that's the case, but the structure does its job in burying the argument so deeply it's hard to find it.

I just wanted more meat from this book. I skimmed over the lengthy summaries of sources I had already read (and that many other readers will have already come across, too), such as Bourdieu and Darnton's seminal works, and wished that these had been relegated to footnotes if anything. I skimmed while hoping to find the author's voice, but it rarely shone through.

It is perhaps unfair to berate an academic book for its writing style, but in this case, it's of paramount importance: the writing is in the way of the content.