altogether. His youth was squandered in miserable apprenticeships to a druggist and then a tinsmith; they ran him ragged on minimal food and five hours of sleep a night. But any resentment that he had was vague and unfocused. He knew a few bookbinder's apprentices who, passing around forbidden books, avowed themselves followers of Paine, but Carlile never paid them much heed.
In 1811 he moved to London to get married and seek a living as a journeyman tinsmith. It was hard to make ends meetâand even harder once Britain suffered a recession. Paine's warning seemed to be coming true: by 1816, with the nation stumbling under a bad harvest and a massive accumulated debt from endless foreign wars, the economy was becoming dire. It was a year, Carlile mused, "that opened my eyes." Scores of banks failed, and wages plummeted nationwide. Worse still was the feeling of powerlessness, as voter qualifications were rigged so that a tiny and well-to-do wealthy portion of the population determined parliamentary elections. Barely employed journeymen and apprentices near Carlile's home on Holborn Hill grumbled among themselves, passing around Cobbett's Political Register and contraband copies of Paine's Rights of Man . The grinding of poverty sharpened the edge of their complaints, Carlile recalledâ"In the manufactories nothing was talked of but revolution." Trapped since childhood in a rigid class system and under a church and state that he vaguely resented without really knowing why, Paine's work at last brought Carlile's inchoate anger into focus. Why did the government have to be like this? Why not reform it? When a new and vehement radical paper called Black Dwarf fell into his hands, it found the tinsmith ready to drop everything for the cause.
"On March 9,1817, I borrowed a pound note from my employer and went and purchased 100 Dwarfs ," Carlile later recalled from his jail cell. The date of his visit to the paper's publisher still stood clear in his mind. "The Dwarf was then at an almost unprofitable [circulation] number, and it was a question about giving it up. However, I traversed the metropolis in every direction to find new shops to sell them . . . I persevered, and many a day traversed thirty miles for a profit of eighteen-pence." Carlile stopped showing up at work much, which was easy for his boss to overlook; the economy was so dreadful that there was little to do there anyway. Within weeks he gave up any pretense of still being a tinsmith: each morning he rose and reported directly to an abandoned auctioneer's storefront at 183 Fleet Street. He was now Richard Carlile, Publisher and Bookseller.
It didn't take long for him to make his mark. Alongside newspapers urging the reform of a parliamentary election which barely any citizens could either qualify to run for or vote in, Carlile also lashed out at the clergy. Upon hearing that publisher William Hone's parody of the Liturgy had been banned by the government, Carlile hoisted placards in his shop window announcing to astonished Londoners that now he would publish it. Even Hone was surprised, since he hadn't given Carlile permission. But Carlile didn't care: to him, his duty was to the book, not to the government or even the author.
"I believe that I am right when I say that this was the first time that ever an individual bade defiance to the veto of the Attorney-General upon any publication whatsoever," Carlile proudly claimed. The astounded head of the local Society for the Suppression of Vice, William Wilberforce, demanded that the blasphemous bookseller be prosecuted. Scarcely five months from the fateful day he borrowed a pound from his old employer, Carlile was sent on his first stretch in prison.
He kept publishing.
To the amazement of the authorities, now Mrs . Carlile ran the shop at 183 Fleet Street. And she just kept on selling Hone's parodies as impudently as ever. It was so blatantly defiant that nobody quite knew what to do . When Jane Carlile's
In 1811 he moved to London to get married and seek a living as a journeyman tinsmith. It was hard to make ends meetâand even harder once Britain suffered a recession. Paine's warning seemed to be coming true: by 1816, with the nation stumbling under a bad harvest and a massive accumulated debt from endless foreign wars, the economy was becoming dire. It was a year, Carlile mused, "that opened my eyes." Scores of banks failed, and wages plummeted nationwide. Worse still was the feeling of powerlessness, as voter qualifications were rigged so that a tiny and well-to-do wealthy portion of the population determined parliamentary elections. Barely employed journeymen and apprentices near Carlile's home on Holborn Hill grumbled among themselves, passing around Cobbett's Political Register and contraband copies of Paine's Rights of Man . The grinding of poverty sharpened the edge of their complaints, Carlile recalledâ"In the manufactories nothing was talked of but revolution." Trapped since childhood in a rigid class system and under a church and state that he vaguely resented without really knowing why, Paine's work at last brought Carlile's inchoate anger into focus. Why did the government have to be like this? Why not reform it? When a new and vehement radical paper called Black Dwarf fell into his hands, it found the tinsmith ready to drop everything for the cause.
"On March 9,1817, I borrowed a pound note from my employer and went and purchased 100 Dwarfs ," Carlile later recalled from his jail cell. The date of his visit to the paper's publisher still stood clear in his mind. "The Dwarf was then at an almost unprofitable [circulation] number, and it was a question about giving it up. However, I traversed the metropolis in every direction to find new shops to sell them . . . I persevered, and many a day traversed thirty miles for a profit of eighteen-pence." Carlile stopped showing up at work much, which was easy for his boss to overlook; the economy was so dreadful that there was little to do there anyway. Within weeks he gave up any pretense of still being a tinsmith: each morning he rose and reported directly to an abandoned auctioneer's storefront at 183 Fleet Street. He was now Richard Carlile, Publisher and Bookseller.
It didn't take long for him to make his mark. Alongside newspapers urging the reform of a parliamentary election which barely any citizens could either qualify to run for or vote in, Carlile also lashed out at the clergy. Upon hearing that publisher William Hone's parody of the Liturgy had been banned by the government, Carlile hoisted placards in his shop window announcing to astonished Londoners that now he would publish it. Even Hone was surprised, since he hadn't given Carlile permission. But Carlile didn't care: to him, his duty was to the book, not to the government or even the author.
"I believe that I am right when I say that this was the first time that ever an individual bade defiance to the veto of the Attorney-General upon any publication whatsoever," Carlile proudly claimed. The astounded head of the local Society for the Suppression of Vice, William Wilberforce, demanded that the blasphemous bookseller be prosecuted. Scarcely five months from the fateful day he borrowed a pound from his old employer, Carlile was sent on his first stretch in prison.
He kept publishing.
To the amazement of the authorities, now Mrs . Carlile ran the shop at 183 Fleet Street. And she just kept on selling Hone's parodies as impudently as ever. It was so blatantly defiant that nobody quite knew what to do . When Jane Carlile's
Similar Books
