Many people have accompanied me on this journey, which would have been a much poorer and far less joyful experience without them. It is a pleasure to acknowledge my many debts.
A.D. Cousins has been a beacon of knowledge, wisdom, generosity of spirit and encouragement. His insights and scholarship have improved the arguments in this book immeasurably, while I alone am responsible for its flaws. I am grateful to Christine Alexander, Clara Tuite and Joanne Wilkes for their reviews of, and valuable advice on, an earlier draft of this monograph, which is also the better for Masja Horn’s and Ronnie Young’s suggestions. Kim Fiona Plas, Jan van Waarden and SPi Global’s sterling work has added considerably to this monograph. Thanks are also due to the Macquarie University library staff for their sustained efforts to procure essential research material.
I am indebted to Lynn Williams whose companionship and intellectual curiosity have influenced this work so positively and in so many ways. My especial thanks go to Margo Lanagan (that evocative sorcerer), Jim Abel and Juliette Napton for their careful review of this work. My gratitude extends to Lee Griggs for nurturing my literary passion over many years, and to John and Collette Napton for their encouragement from afar throughout this endeavour. Thanks also go to Les Vance for challenging my paradigms and arguments with forthright good humour; they are the better for his doing so.
For their unstinting support and friendship, I am grateful to Sandra Abel, Brad Anderson, Sarah Archer, Jennifer Arculus, Nic Astudillo, Penny Blythman, Helen Campbell, Vanessa Cavagnaro, Melanie Clarke, Anne and Catriona Coote, Jo Defries, Lauren Fine, Elizabeth and Geoffrey Fisher, Elsa Hill, Patrick Hung, Amy Jones, Sophie Khouchaba, Marlya MacNeill, Jo Miles, Jane Smith, Rachael Smith, Jodi Staunton Smith, Wen Ming Tan, Clare Thurling, Sarah Van Cooten, Kim Virtue-Wilson, Shelley Walder, Jane Wakeling, Joy Wright and Sara Wright.
Finally I am deeply grateful to Shelley, Peter, Tony, Juliette and Benjamin, who have been such a constant source of love, encouragement and support.
Earlier and different versions of material in this book have appeared in: AUMLA: Journal of the Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association (parts of Chapter 1); SEL: Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 with Stephanie Russo (parts of Chapter 2); The French Revolution and the British Novel in the Romantic Period (Peiterlen, Switzerland: Peter Lang, 2012) and Home and Nation in British Literature from the English to the French Revolutions (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) (parts of Chapter 4); and The Explicator with A.D. Cousins (parts of Chapter 5).