Explain three reasons which created a large number of new readers in the 19th century.
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New readers in the 19th century included children, women and workers.
(i) As primary education became compulsory in the late 19th century, children became an important category of readers. School textbooks had to be published. In France, a children press was started, which published new works as well as old fairy tales.
(ii) Women became important as readers as well as writers. Penny magzines were meant for women, as were manuals, teaching proper behaviour and housekeeping. When novels were written in the 19th century, women became important readers.
(iii) In the 19th century, lending libraries in England, sent books to white-collar workers, artisans and lower middle class people and became instrumental in educating them. They also wrote political tracts and autobiographies.