In this pioneering work about the precursor to the comic book, Kelly Boyd traces the evolution of the boys' story paper and its impact on the imaginative world of working-class readers. From the penny dreadful and the Boy's Own Paper to the tales of Billy Bunter and Sexton Blake, this cultural form shaped ideas about gender, race, class and empire in response to social change. This study is an important analysis of a neglected part of popular culture.

This edition includes: Novels: Burmese Days A Clergyman's Daughter Keep the Aspidistra Flying Coming Up for Air Animal Farm 1984 Poetry: Awake! Young Men of England Kitchener Our Hearts Are Married, But We Are Too Young The Pagan Poem from Burma The Lesser Evil Romance Summer-like for an Instant The Italian Soldier Shook My Hand... Reflections on War and Society: Spilling the Spanish Beans Not Counting Niggers Prophecies of Fascism Wells, Hitler and the World State Looking Back on the Spanish War Who Are the War Criminals? Future of a Ruined Germany Revenge is Sour You and the Atomic Bomb Notes on Nationalism Catastrophic Gradualism Freedom of the Park How the Poor Die In Front of Your Nose Thoughts on England: Democracy in the British Army The Lion and the Unicorn Antisemitism in Britain In Defence of English Cooking Decline of the English Murder Politics and the English Language Views on Literature, Art & Famous Men: In Defence of the Novel Notes on the Way Charles Dickens Literature and Totalitarianism The Art of Donald Mcgill Rudyard Kipling W. B. Yeats Mark Twain—the Licensed Jester Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool Writers and Leviathan Reflections on Gandhi... Book Reviews: Mein Kampf The Totalitarian Enemy... Miscellaneous Writings: A Farthing Newspaper The Spike Boys' Weeklies and Frank Richards's Reply Poetry and the Microphone The Sporting Spirit... Autobiographical Works: A Hanging Down and Out in Paris and London Bookshop Memories Shooting an Elephant The Road to Wigan Pier Homage to Catalonia Marrakech Why I Write...