Considering the several meanings of the term "materiality of writing" in the context of mid-19th-century literature, Hack (English, SUNY Buffalo) argues that attention to writing's material components and contexts does not constitute reading against the grain, as much contemporary criticism insists. He contends that Victorian discourse on authorship and novels by such authors as Dickens, Eliot, Thackeray and Collins investigate the relevance of the written or printed word's physicality, the exchange of texts for money, the workings of signification, and the corporeality of writers, readers and characters. Annotation ©2005 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)