Summary: | When the English government fell apart and censorship effectively ended in 1640, pamphlets about current events began appearing on the London streets almost immediately. Thousands of editions were printed in the 20 years before the iron fist returned. Most of those that have survived are in obscure archives, more or less slowly falling into dust; the few published collections are too massive and expensive for all but the wealthiest libraries, let alone independent scholars. Raymond's selection of several hundred is therefore a major contribution to scholarship both of the period and of journalism. He presents them in sections on such political events as the Long Parliament and the civil war, but also on such aspects of life as health, crime, popular religion, and commentary by and about women. Acidic paper. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.
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