Robert Louis Stevenson and theories of reading

Book excerpt: Robert Louis Stevenson and theories of reading is both an exceptionally well researched study of the novelist, and well as an intriguing exploration of 'literary consumption'. Glenda Norquay presents fresh interpretations of Stevenson’s literary essays, of major works including The Master of Ballantrae, and some of his more neglected fiction such as St Ives and The Wrecker, as well as illuminating our understanding of his role within debates over popular fiction, romance and reading pleasure. She offers an unusual combination of literary history and reception theory and argues that Stevenson both exemplified tensions within the literary market of his time and anticipated later developments in reading theory. By combining the study of nineteenth-century cultural politics with detailed analysis of his Scottish Calvinism, Stevenson is reassessed as both a Victorian and Scottish writer. The book is aimed at scholars, postgraduates and undergraduates with an interest in the nineteenth-century literary marketplace, in Scottish culture, and in reading /reception theory as well as Stevenson enthusiasts.