Contents

• Creating the text of life : motives and practices of diarists and correspondents
• Creating texts from other texts : deploying preexisting literature
• Everyday literature : writing within genre conventions
• Everyday dissemination : literature sent via letters, newspapers, and bundles
• On account of the donor : presenting and receiving literary gifts
• Through many hands : lending and borrowing reading material
• Literary performances : dissemination through reading aloud, recitation, and enactment
• Receiving the word : literary socialization and modes of readings
• Personal ideals and social realities : finding time to read
• Within the collective : receiving public lectures and readings
• Social imprints : reception of books and periodicals as objects - - The sayings and doings of nobodies : everyday reception of the printed word