Transatlantic Digital Moonstone Project: Part XXIX - Georgia Baker

The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins was published in two periodicals, Harper’s Weekly in America, and All the Year Round in England. When reading them next to each other, it is evident that America’s The Moonstone is a lot more consumer or business based on the pages of advertisements and news. All the Year Round contains no big illustrations or advertisements in the periodical but features other chapters of a series or poetry. This project focusses on Part XXIX of The Moonstone, which is the week of July 18, 1868.

For the sake of this argument, Molly Knox Leverenz says that “Harper’s Weekly might function either as the hand passing forth the light of civilization or as the determiner and architect of civilization itself” (21). This could be possible in the sense that Harper’s Weekly does have advertisements and recent news from that week included in their publication. Those can be seen as a way of molding the public to a higher standard.

As well, she argues that there is “particular attention to discussions of globalization and imperialism” (24). The four photos that were taken from Harper’s Weekly and All the Year Round further this argument through the use of language, and the events happening in the illustrations. Through the events being explained it is evident that these periodicals are meant for the men in the household, who are qualified enough to be able to understand politics. In that case, it can be argued that Harper’s Weekly and All the Year Round are geared towards audiences of a higher class since they are the ones who can afford to be highly educated, and they believe since they are educated they are superior to the "Other".

Works Cited

Dickens, Charles. All the Year Round: A Weekly Journal. 28 July 1868, pp. 121-144.

Glover, Juleanna, et al. “The Worst Convention in U.S. History?” POLITICO Magazine, 22 July 2016,                              https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/07/rnc-2016-worst-convention-historians-214091.

Harper's Weekly: A Journal of Civilization. 28 July 1868, pp. 449-464.

Leverenz, Molly Knox. “Illustrating The Moonstone in America: Harper’s Weekly and Transatlantic Introspection.” American        Periodicals: A Journal of History & Criticism, vol. 24, no. 1, 2014, pp. 21–44.