An underground history of early Victorian fiction : Chartism radical print culture and the social problem novel Introduction: can a social problem speak Social inheritance in the new poor law debate: William Cobbett Harriet Martineau and the Royal Commission of Inquiry Books of (social) murder: melodrama and the slow violence of the market in anti new poor law satire fiction and journalism A life in fragments: Thomas Coopers Chartist Bildungsroman Questions from workers who read: education and self formation in Chartist print culture and Elizabeth Gaskells Mary Barton Revenge in the age of insurance: villainy in theatrical melodrama and Ernest Joness fiction Outworks of the citadel of corruption : the Chartist press reports the empire Two nations revisited: the refugee question in the peoples paper household words and Charles Dickenss A tale of two cities