Entertaining the Empire: London Music Hall and the Export of Britishness (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781526188892)

The stage entertainments known as music hall emerged in mid-Victorian London just as the British began colonising large parts of the world.Settlers recreated this metropolitan popular culture throughout the empire and in places under foreign control. They erected music halls resembling those at home, imported songs and sketches, performed inamateur shows and watched touring professionals. London originals were rewritten as commentaries on local conditions. This activity transformed music hall into a marker of an exclusionary British identity overseas and made colonies look and sound more like Britain. The result was that settlers separated by vast distances were linked by a shared popular culture. The touring circuits and cultural affinities the Victorians created endure to this day.

Author: Andrew Horrall
ISBN-10: 1526188899
ISBN-13: 9781526188892
Publisher: Manchester University Press
Language: English
Published: 10/28/2025
Pages: 280
Format: Hardcover