Climates of Respectability in Sensational Urban Publishing

This essay explores the development of sensational urban writing by focusing on three influential authors of the genre, Ned Buntline, George Foster, and Solon Robinson. During the 1840s and 1850s, these writers not only... [ view full abstract ]

This essay explores the development of sensational urban writing by focusing on three influential authors of the genre, Ned Buntline, George Foster, and Solon Robinson. During the 1840s and 1850s, these writers not only produced a number of bestselling publications, but they also emerged as important figures in a a literary marketplace that rewarded authors for their ability to effect both commercial success and literary authority. Although Michael Denning and David Reynolds have suggested that sensational authors tended to be self-identifying heroes of working-class culture, standing to lose little by the condemnation of elite critics or prudish moralizers, biographical accounts of such authors, and their publishers, indicate that many were deeply invested in sustaining a credible appearance of respectability, especially in the context of the larger literary scene in which they sought to position themselves as legitimate actors. Examining prefaces, trade catalogs, periodical reviews, and obituaries, among other archival sources, I trace the strategies sensational authors used to maintain a semblance of status and taste—including locating themselves in the heart of New York’s publishing district, cultivating relationships with respected authors and editors, and advertising their proximity to those figures and to Broadway. I argue that these strategies highlight the literary, rather than just commercial, ambitions of sensational authors, revealing sensational urban texts to be less concerned with exposing the city’s poor and criminal than with showcasing the rhetorical prowess required to succeed in a marketplace that both mandated and made suspect appeals to a mass reading public.