The Social Life of Books

Books don't exist in a vacuum and reading isn't a solitary activity conducted on the couch. Books have a social life: they are mediated through multiple channels, whether TikTok reviews, prizes, bookseller recommendations, or national curricula. We read in multiple ways: we judge the book by its cover, imprint, format, or locale, and we read on our own and together, online and off. This Element offers an introduction to the ways in which books are produced, circulated, evaluated, and talked in the twenty-first century by attending to the book's 'paratexts'. Organised around a single case study-Bernardine Evaristo's Girl, Woman, Other-methodologically innovative sections follow the novel and its paratexts across different activities that together constitute the 'social life of books', to demonstrate the value of book history approaches to studying literature today.