As the provincial press has declined in Britain, so too has local arts and cultural criticism. In the 19th and early 20th century, regional newspapers regularly published reviews of theatre productions and a wide variety of books including history, science, travel writing, poetry and fiction.
Starting in the late 19th century and coming to a head in the Edwardian period (1901-1914), regional newspapers even experimented with a different style of reviewing, which was shorter, chattier and more personal – a shift from the more formal style of the Victorian era.
