The Business of Letters: Authorial Economies in Antebellum America
Leon Jackson
Traditionally, scholars of authorship in antebellum America have approached their subject through the lens of professionalization, exploring the ways in which writing moved away from amateurism and into the capitalist marketplace. The Business of Letters breaks new ground by challenging the dominant professionalization model, with its vision of a single literary marketplace. Leon Jackson shows how antebellum authors participated in a variety of different economies including patronage, charity, gift exchange, and competition—each of which had its own rules and reciprocities, its own ethics and exchange rituals, and sometimes even its own currencies. Examining a variety of canonical and non-canonical authors, ... Read more
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