The Reading Revolution was in force as a pursuit for the wealthy. There was an opposition to anything that took labourers from work, and reading labourers were thought to be a bad idea. It was required by law in England that all children attend school. For those of the labouring poor, the only way to be schooled was via charity or blue collar schools. Reading was taught initially around the age of five, which started with the Lord’s Prayer and the Bible. Children were taught to recognize letters and put them into words. Writing would come much later if it was vital to their education. Many people tended to be semi-literate, if not illiterate.
Alan Ramsay began a revolution by hiring out his books and selling him. A circulating library was what he created. Nestled amongst the shops, it was an unlikely sight. One could rent books for a fee and make them their own for a while. Without his idea, the public library may never have existed. By the 1740s, every town had a circulating library. Some felt that encouraging literacy was a bad idea. High minded moralists saw them as markets of titillation and botching readers’ minds, especially those of women. Women audiences could no longer be kept in the dark. It was previously believed that girls reading books would get a false sense of the world and their place in it. Some well-to-do women could read, but most had been excluded from literary debates. Books gave women access to talking points, politics, scandals, etc. There were very few female authors and professors, because they were not encouraged to be intellectuals. It was their courage that gave way to feminism.
The novel is considered by many to be the triumph of the 18th Century, because it could teach people about themselves. Some still saw it as frivolous and a danger. Colorless moral text readers could not compete with the novel, which allowed you to identify with characters. The hero or heroine was a fictional character in your world. Samuel Richardson’s Pamela was one of the first bestsellers. In one village, the parish church ran its bells when the title character was married. Novelists invited readers to explore society and themselves. Previously, women could not go out and discuss literary works with others, but now, they started sharing experiences of reading.
Reading was for the few that could read, but the Reading Revolution changed all that by having the British become voracious readers.
