Quote:
Originally Posted by WT Sharpe
For my second nomination, I nominate What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist—the Facts of Daily Life in Nineteenth-Century England by Daniel Pool (print length: 416 pages).
Amazon UK / Amazon US / Barnes & Noble / Kobo / Sony Reader Store
Spoiler:
Amazon Book Description:
Publication Date: October 2, 2012
For every frustrated reader of the great nineteenth-century English novels of Austen, Trollope, Dickens, or the Brontės who has ever wondered whether a duke outranked an earl, when to yell "Tally Ho!" at a fox hunt, or how one landed in "debtor's prison," here is a "delightful reader's companion that lights up the literary dark" (The New York Times).
This fascinating, lively guide clarifies the sometimes bizarre maze of rules, regulations, and customs that governed everyday life in Victorian England. Author Daniel Pool provides countless intriguing details (did you know that the "plums" in Christmas plum pudding were actually raisins?) on the Church of England, sex, Parliament, dinner parties, country house visiting, and a host of other aspects of nineteenth-century English life -- both "upstairs" and "downstairs."
An illuminating glossary gives at a glance the meaning and significance of terms ranging from "ague" to "wainscoting," the specifics of the currency system, and a lively host of other details and curiosities of the day.
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I third this. A note on the length - it is listed as 416 pages but there is a glossary that is 138 pages, so the book itself is actually only 278 pages.
I also third We Wish to Inform You that Tomorrow We Will be Killed with Our Families: Stories from Rwanda.
Nyssa, both HIMS' nominations have links in them that could be added to the list.