Advertising, Subjectivity and the Nineteenth-Century Novel: Dickens, Balzac and the Language of the Walls (Palgrave Studies in Nineteenth-Century Writing and Culture)

"The language of the walls" is a central concept in this inquiry into advertising's influence on production and consumption of fiction from 1830-70. New systems of advertising (on hoardings, posters, in periodicals and novels) were changing reading practices and producing a new subject hailed by the text and image of the urban landscape. This study considers the first recognition of a "virtual" world, theorizes and historicizes a crucial moment in print culture and proposes new readings of key texts.