"The Athens of England": Norwich as a Literary Center in the Late Eighteenth Century

The massive increase in provincial urban culture in Britain in the eighteenth century, long recognized by social historians, has only recently begun to register in literary scholarship. Norwich was then one of the leading provincial cities in England and this essay selects it as an exemplary test case for investigating the ways and means in which a city with only a very limited literary tradition could develop itself as an important literary center in this period. The intellectual culture of the Dissenting Octagon Chapel, the Norwich Theatre Royal, and the local newspapers are seen as central to Norwich's literary flowering.