"Urbane and rustic England shows, as no other work has done, how a persistent urban-rural divide shaped conscious choices at the heart of experience in early modern England. Contrary to modern assumptions, villagers and migrants of rural origin widely resisted the cultural and social influence of cities and towns well into the second half of the eighteenth century.

Sexual relations, work, consumerism, the printed word, celebration, protest, hospitality and xenophobia were all influenced by people's profound identification with their natural and artificial surroundings. This book reveals that the dynamic of urbane and rustic mentalities had a place with gender awareness, class consciousness and religious belief among the forces of continuity and change in early modern society."--BOOK JACKET.

"Urbane and rustic England is essential reading for historians of early modern England and their students. Readers with a more general interest in the relationship between community and culture will be drawn to the subject matter and approach of this book."--BOOK JACKET.