Periodical Poetry, Editorial Policy, and W. E. Henley’s Scots and National Observer

This article examines the role of poetry in relation to the holistic editorial policy of a prominent fin de siècle periodical overseen by a well-known poet and man of letters: W. E. Henley, who edited the Scots and National Observer from January 1889 to March 1894. Employing materialist, political, and quantitative analysis, I demonstrate the relation of signed to unsigned poetry, the significant distinctions between the journal’s first iteration as a Scottish paper and its rebranding as the National Observer, and poetry’s usefulness as a gauge of Henley’s editorial fortunes.