Penny dreadfuls were cheap, sensationalized magazines popular with working-class male adolescents in 19th century Britain. They featured exaggerated stories of outlaws and lawmen, and inspired future writers and filmmakers. The low-quality paper used gave rise to the term pulp fiction. Few original copies remain, and readers may have formed informal clubs to share them.
Since the mid-1800s, lurid and largely fictionalized accounts of rogue highwaymen, professional criminals, and other larger-than-life characters have often been published in a low-budget pulp magazine known as a dime novel in America or a penny dreadful in America. Great Britain . A penny dreadful’s primary audience was working-class male adolescents who enjoyed reading melodramatic stories of exaggerated audacity. American outlaws and legendary lawmen have also become popular protagonists of serial novels reworked for a British audience.
A terrible penny really cost a British penny, and was generally filled with short articles and a serial written specifically for a young male audience. The cover often featured action scenes with lurid title graphics. A typical dreadful penny was small in size, rarely more than 10 pages per issue, but publishers often released new issues weeks apart. The paper used to produce these books was notoriously cheap, which gave rise to the term pulp fiction, a genre that features the same sensational or melodramatic plots often found in them.
The British penny dreadful and the American dime were generally dismissed in their time as low-grade literature, but many future writers found inspiration in their pages. Many of the plots and characters of early silent films can be traced directly to popular dreadful series. The idea of serializing adventure novels became popular with readers of these books, so it became the template for serialized shorts often shown before the main feature films.
As the quality of the publication was not high in the beginning and the paper used tended to deteriorate rapidly, there are very few original dreadful pennies in collections today. Early readers may also have formed informal reading clubs in which the same number of pennies would be passed from member to member. For many British boys from lower-class families, even earning a British penny would have been a challenge. It wasn’t unusual for groups of kids to pool their funds to buy the last awful penny, much like the comic book culture of the later era.
Protect your devices with Threat Protection by NordVPN
