The Forger's Shadow: How Forgery Changed the Course of Literature

Groom, Nick

ISBN 10: 0330374338 / ISBN 13: 9780330374330

Published by Picador, London, 2003

About this Item

How Forgery Changed the Course of Literature. Includes bibliography, acknowledgements, plus index. First printing of this Picador edition, with "1" as the lowest number in print number line on copyright page. Printed in Great Britain. Slight handling wear, rubbing to rear cover with faded lettering, bookseller's small label to rear cover, otherwise a nice clean tight solid softcover copy. 351pp. SB-47.

Seller Inventory # 034705

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Forger's Shadow: How Forgery Changed the Course of Literature
• Publisher: Picador, London
• Publication Date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0330374338
• ISBN 13: 9780330374330
• Binding: Pictorial Wraps
• Edition: First Thus
• Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • True Crime
  • Literary Criticism

About this title

Synopsis

Whilst defining the very meaning of forgery, Nick Groom ranges from the economic forgery of the 18th century, where the forgery of a #100 banknote could mean death by hanging, to the formation of literary copyright which was established not in order to protect the nation's authors but rather as a way of censoring them. haunted both our literature and our imaginations for years. There is Chatterton, the fatal model for the Romantic perceived as a mad, unrecognized and suicidal genius but one whose supposedly tragic life was as much a myth as the 15th-century monk he invented. Or there is Macpherson, constantly at war with Samuel Johnson, who edited (or wrote, or indeed forged) the lost epics of a 3rd-century Celtic bard. And there is the forger William Henry Ireland who not only wrote two new and disastrous Shakespeare plays but also forged a legal document to make sure he benefited from the royalties. Finally, there is the famous Wainewright who was a supreme forger in practically every sphere, whose effect on literature from Dickens to Wilde to the 21st century cannot be underestimated.

About the Author

Nick Groom is Senior Lecturer in Post-Mediaeval Literature at the University of Bristol. He took a double first in English at Oxford, worked unsuccessfully as a rock musician, wrote a doctoral thesis on eighteenth-century ballads and since then has published widely on literature, music and contemporary art in both academic and popular publications. He lives on Dartmoor and in North London.