The Nocturnal Spheres of Eighteenth-Century London: A Literary and Cultural History

Abstract

My thesis examines the nocturnal side of eighteenth-century London and how a variety of eighteenth-century texts, including periodical essays, novels, poems, newspaper reports, and spy and ramble narratives, describe, represent, and reimagine certain aspects of the urban night. London in the eighteenth century, with its newly developed nightlife venues such as the coffeehouse, has been closely associated with the emergence of the Habermasian public sphere and its characteristic Enlightenment sociability. Despite being considered the hub of an enlightened and rationalist culture, the nocturnal city displayed a productive tension between the seemingly opposing powers of light and darkness, politeness and indecorum, control and anarchy, and reason and unreason. Drawing on Habermas's model but also disputing its idealization and exclusivity, I coin the term "nocturnal sphere" to describe the city's after-dark world, which saw not only an increase in people’s communicative interactions, the development of sociability and the popularity of different forms of entertainment, but also the occurrence of night-time threat and danger, the suffering of the poor, and the transgressive forces of those who drew on the shadowy hours to fulfil their own needs, over whom the authorities sought to exert their power. My research is undertaken at the intersection of the history of London's daily life and a literary history of the urban night, which means besides a historical perspective, the urban night will also be viewed as a literary invention by which numerous eighteenth-century writers represent and discuss the night side of a burgeoning urban culture.

Date of Award	1 Oct 2024
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	King's College London
Supervisor	Clare Brant (Supervisor) & Emrys Jones (Supervisor)