Plague was one of the enduring facts of everyday life on the European continent, from earliest antiquity through the first decades of the 18th century. This book offers coverage of the religious and the psychological dimensions of plague and of European society's response to it through many centuries and over a wide geographical terrain.

Presents a study of the image of the woman reader in Victorian and Edwardian culture and literature. This book draws on a range of texts from 'high' literature to advice manuals, autobiographies to medical and psychological writings in order to examine the controversies surrounding what, where, and how women should read.