LAUSR

Fascination with ancient Egypt and Egyptiana permeated British culture in the nineteenth century. A trip to Egypt was well within the means of upper-class Victorians, who could see for themselves the wonders of the pyramids. For the middle classes, however, even with Egypt increasingly accessible as a result of the endeavours of Thomas Cook & Son, armchair travel was an attractive alternative. Books and periodicals provided the opportunity to explore ancient Egypt without ever leaving the British Isles. Andrew Wheatcroft (2003) has noted the diverse generic categories into which publications addressing ancient Egypt have fallen since the nineteenth century onwards: fieldwork and survey reports, academic monographs, popular scholarly books, illustrated or photographic books and mystical or sensational fiction and nonfiction. While many of these literary forms have been addressed by recent scholarship, this essay scrutinises the final category in the form of periodicals, which by their numerous and diverse offerings indicate the sheer enthusiasm held by Victorian audiences for ancient Egypt. I examine the articles, essays, and travelogues on ancient Egypt in Belgravia: A London Magazine from 1866 through to 1876, the years in which Mary Elizabeth Braddon (the magazine’s founder) was editor. I focus on Belgravia, firstly, as it was notably successful, with a monthly circulation of between 15,000 and 18,000 during Braddon’s tenure, and so is emblematic of the popular contemporary periodical (and with it, popular tastes), and secondly, because Braddon specifically has been shown to have wooed her readership by providing reading material that directly corresponded to public desires. Richard D. Altick, in The English Common Reader, mentions Belgravia specifically, categorising it as a leading monthly of the class of Temple Bar and St. James (1957, 359). Belgravia was also listed in Alvar Ellegard’s survey of the Victorian press, which included “all the more important periodicals that were in some degree organs of opinion” (1957, 4). As Ellegard states, “Any student of the history of a period will find much to interest him in its press, where the age, so to speak, portrays itself” (3). That both Altick and Ellegard cite Belgravia as an example of a leading monthly illustrates the magazine’s prominent position, and therefore, its legitimacy in representing popular Victorian interest. Braddon’s desire to continuously capture a wider audience, meanwhile, has been covered extensively by scholars including Jennifer Phegley (2004), Lyn Pykett (2011), and Solveig C. Robinson (1995).