It is high treason in British law to imagine the king's death. But after the execution of Louis XVI in 1793, everyone in Britain must have found themselves imagining that the same fate might befall George III. How easy was it to distinguish between fantasising about the death of George and imagining it, in the legal sense of intending or designing? John Barrell examines this question in the context of the political trials of the mid-1790s and the controversies they generated. He shows how the law of treason was adapted in the years following Louis's death to punish what was acknowledged to be a "modern" form of treason unheard of when the law had been framed. The result, he argues, was the invention of a new and imaginary reading, a "figurative" treason, by which the question of who was imagining the king's death, the supposed traitors or those who charged them with treason, became inseparable.

A supporter of the American rebellion and advocate of radical ideas on religion, philosophy, education, law, medicine, and politics, John Jebb (1736-1786) provides an ideal case to examine the nature of radicalism in 18th-century Britain. Jebb began his career as a clergyman and academic at Cambridge in the 1760s and died as a doctor and leading figure among political reformers in Enlightenment London. Profoundly influenced by David Hartley's attempt to combine a Christian theology of universal salvation with a materialist and determinist account of the mind, Jebb's philosophical and religious radicalism inspired him to work tirelessly for reform. This is the first modern extended study of his life. While at Cambridge, Jebb provoked strong conservative opposition to his religious views and proposals for academic reform. Increasingly marginalized in church and university, as a tide of loyalism swept the country in response to rebellion in America, Jebb resigned as a clergyman and moved to London to work as a doctor. As the American war dragged on with no end in sight, a popular movement urging political reform developed. Jebb became a leader of this movement and was instrumental in establishing a platform that called for universal suffrage and annual elections. British radicals would continue to campaign for this platform until the mid-19th century.

This book explores the relationship between religion and politics in England from the accession of George III to the First Reform Bill, considering the political and social ideas of Catholics, Anglicans, Methodists, Dissenters, deists and atheists. It examines the effect of the French Revolution on Christian political and social theory as well as reactions to the American Revolution, riots and disorder, economic and social education, secularisation, 'Blasphemy and Sedition', the growth of atheism, and the Reform of the Constitution in 1826-32. Major figures such as Burke, Paine, Wollstonecraft, Coleridge, Bentham and Wesley are considered, but popular, everyday arguments are also analysed. The book examines Christian views on political obligation and the right of rebellion, and suggests that religion was used as a means of social control to maintain public order and stability in a rapidly changing society.

This fascinating book examines what sixteen radical and conservative, famous and notorious British women wrote about their sex in the 1790s. It offers the most comprehensive survey of what they thought about their fellow women with regard to love, sexual desire and marriage; their domestic roles and their engagement in the ‘public’ sphere; and issues of gender and female abilities including sensibility and genius. How contemporary reviewers divided women writers into ‘unsex’d’ and ‘proper’ is investigated, as is the issue of whether they attempted to exclude women from certain kinds of writing. The book reveals the depth of female complaint but contends that women did not passively submit. Conservative and radicals alike sought to extend their sphere of activity, to reform men, challenge gender stereotypes and propose that a woman should be a self for herself and her God rather than for her husband.

This book takes a new look at the evolution of popular literature in Britain in the Romantic and Victorian periods. Making use of a wide range of archival and primary sources, he argues that radical politics played a decisive role in the transformation of popular literature. By charting the key moments in the history of 'cheap' literature, the book casts new light on the many neglected popular genres and texts: the 'pig's meat' anthology, the female-authored didactic tale, and Chartist fiction.