One good thing about the age we live in is that it is easier than ever for readers to discover those “lost narratives” that didn’t find their way into the Canon

One good thing about the age we live in is that it is easier than ever for readers to discover those “lost narratives” that didn’t find their way into the Canon. The Internet Archive, for example, hosts scans of millions of older books that can be read online and downloaded for free. Among the genres I’ve explored to my own benefit and enjoyment over the past decade have been travel narratives [1], the humor and sports writing of Pierce Egan (1772–1849) [2], and 19th-century novels [3]. The novels, I thought, have been a particularly unfortunate victim of the filter of the “classics.” In the 19th century, they played a role similar to that of television dramas in the streaming era: immersive, commercial, produced in large numbers, intended primarily as entertainment, and ranging in quality from junk to great art. Most have been completely forgotten, but many are still worth reading. [1] http://blog.archive.org/2019/01/28/the-world-as-they-saw-it/ http://blog.archive.org/2019/01/28/the-world-as-they-saw-it/ [2] https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Egan%2C+Pierce%2C+1772-1849%22 https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Egan%2C+Pi... [3] https://archive.org/search.php?query=%28novel%29%20AND%20mediatype%3A%28texts%29%20AND%20date%3A%5B1800-01-01%20TO%201899-12-31%5D https://archive.org/search.php?query=%28novel%29%20AND%20med...