Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Contents v
3. Illustrations vi
4. Series Preface viii
5. Acknowledgements ix
6. Introduction: Imagining Clubland 1
7. 1 Club Chatter, Gossip and Smoking: The ‘Idler’s Club’ Column as a Reader’s Space 32
8. 2 The Pressroom and the Clubroom: Working Women and Idling Men in Jerome K. Jerome’s Tommy and Co 61
9. 3 The Club Story and Social Mobility: Rules for Readers in Israel Zangwill and Barry Pain 91
10. 4 The Mysteries of Male Friendship: Uncovering the Club in Stevenson, Doyle, Chesterton and Sayers 136
11. 5 Through a Club Window Wistfully: J. M. Barrie and the Politics of Social Awkwardness 170
12. 6 Idlers and Drones: P. G. Wodehouse and Twentieth-Century Class Confusion 208
13. Conclusion: Mass Readership, Then and Now 241
14. Appendix: The Numbers on Women in the ‘Idler’s Club’ 247
15. Bibliography 253
16. Index 268