A World of Fiction: Digital Collections and the Future of Literary History (Digital Humanities) by Katherine Bode

Author:Katherine Bode [Bode, Katherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Published: 2018-07-04T23:00:00+00:00

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Existing accounts of fiction reprinting in nineteenth-century Australian newspapers identify the mid- to late 1880s as a period of dramatic change, marked by the arrival and immediate dominance of British syndication agencies, principally Tillotson’s. Critics agree that prior to this time no established systems existed for sourcing overseas content. According to Johnson-Woods, it is a “mystery” how imported serials came to Australia during this period, but it is likely that pirating was involved, especially where American fiction was concerned (Index 6). Others describe how colonial newspaper editors obtained fiction by contracting with individual British authors (Morrison, “Serial” 311–12; Johnson-Woods, “Mary” 112–13) and through “unauthorized ‘borrowings,’” with short fiction more likely to come from local publications and extended fiction from overseas (Law, “Savouring” 81).

Law ascribes Tillotson’s dedicated involvement with the colonial market to “financial pressures in their home market” (Serialising 80). Whereas the company experienced strong growth in sales to English newspapers from its beginnings in 1873 to the mid-1880s, toward the end of that decade Tillotson’s was compelled “to search more energetically for returns elsewhere . . . [through] ventures into America, the Colonies, and Europe” (80). In making this move, Law argues, the agency dealt only with “major city journals” (76). The “standard arrangement for works by well-known writers like [Mary Elizabeth] Braddon” was for Tillotson’s “to offer serial rights in a single colony for £75, or entire Australian and New Zealand rights for £100, thus leaving a Colonial editor or agent to sell on copy to other journals” (76). Eggert concurs with Law’s assessment of the timing when he argues that overseas “agents . . . saturated the local market with imported serials” from the mid-1880s (“Robbery” 129). Others join Law in emphasizing the Tillotson’s dominance. Johnson-Woods notes that Tillotson’s provided “nearly all of [the] imported stories” in major metropolitan newspapers (Index 6). Scholars also generally agree that the entry of overseas syndicates into the Australian market had a deleterious effect on local literary production. Christopher Hilliard argues that fiction was supplied to the Australian colonies so cheaply by overseas syndication agencies, Tillotson’s in particular, that local literary production was significantly constrained (662).

This established account would lead us to anticipate relatively haphazard and minor incidents of fiction reprinting in colonial newspapers until the mid- to late 1880s, followed by a sudden and substantial increase and consistency in the practice. The solid gray line in figure 10, indicating the proportion of titles reprinted among metropolitan publications per year,10 shows the opposite of this trend. High (though uneven) rates of reprinting prior to the mid-1880s are followed by an overall decline. This trend requires qualification, due to a phenomenon I call companion reprinting. From the late 1850s, multiple daily metropolitan newspapers established weekly companions. As might be expected—and as the dotted black line in figure 10 indicates—these jointly owned, often jointly edited, newspapers frequently published the same stories.

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