Browsing by Subject "ECCO"

The Spectator by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele was a periodical that was originally published between 1711 and 1714, which handled varied subjects while aiming to advance moral and wit of its readers. The periodical was highly popular during its original run, and it stayed prominent throughout the century because there were new editions and books reusing its contents. Today the periodical stays prevalent as a source in the research of the eighteenth century and has been linked especially to the study of public sphere. In this thesis I analyse the popularity of the Spectator in the eighteenth century and how it maintained its prominence through new editions of the periodical and anthologies using it. In my study I will assess which parts and themes of the paper lead to this popularity and how that should affect the way we consider the Spectator today. In addition to this I will consider the effect the publishers and especially the publishing dynasty of the Tonsons had on the success of the periodical. The method of the thesis is mainly quantitative, and my arguments are based on analysis made with R programming language using English Short Title Catalogue and Eighteenth Century Collections Online datasets. The datasets, in the form they are used here, have been provided and formed by COMHIS group. Based on the data, I have been able to assess the quantity and quality of the editions as well as reuse of the Spectator. In addition to the computational methods, I have read the original papers of the Spectator to contextualize the reuse. In this thesis I argue that the Spectator established its popularity during its original run and managed to retain it throughout the century. This popularity was mainly due to two styles of content. First type was instructional texts, which were often moral and religious in nature and the second literary criticism. The role of literary criticism is also important because it shows how the Spectator took part in creating the literary canon instead of just showing how the periodical itself became part of it. The exemplary style of writing also played a major role in the popularity of the Spectator. In addition to the content the popularity of the Spectator was affected by the publishers of the periodical. When it comes to publishing the editions of the Spectator and reusing the literary criticism of the periodical, the Tonsons had an unquestionable effect on the field. Still, the reuse and especially reuse of instructional texts was a wider phenomenon affecting the whole field and can be seen across educational books of the time but cannot be attributed to individual publishers.