In the first decades of the 20th Century, a growth in literacy and the availability of paperback and hardback books created a culture of mass participation on literary reading that was unprecedented. Nicola Wilson’s new book Recommended, a history of the Book Society, tells the story of Hugh Walpole, JB Priestley and Cecil Day Lewis amongst others and how they created the first mass book club which sent monthly recommendations to lower middle class and working class readers. Here we hear from Ni
Reading time:
1–2 minutes
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For more than a decade, the Explaining History Podcast has helped listeners around the world make sense of modern history. What began in 2012 as a simple experiment—short, accessible episodes explaining major historical events—has grown into a long-running library of carefully researched, thoughtful explorations of the 20th and 21st centuries.
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