What thrilled our grandparents and great grandparents in cinemas across Scotland?
This is the first scholarly work to document the cinema habits of early 20th-century Scots, exploring the growth of early cinema-going and integrating the study of cinema into wider debates in social and economic history. The author draws extensively on archival resources concerning the cinema as a business, on documentation kept by cinema managers, and on the diaries and recollections of cinema-goers. He considers patterns of cinema-going and attendance levels, as well as changes in audience preferences for different genres, stars or national origins of films.
The thematic chapters broaden out the discussion of cinema-going to consider the wider social and cultural impact of this early form of mass leisure. Trevor Griffiths' book is a major contribution to the growing body of work on the history and significance of British film.
Trevor Griffiths is a senior lecturer in Economic and Social History at the University of Edinburgh. He is co-editor of A History of Everyday Life in Scotland, 1800 to 1900 (Edinburgh University Press, 2010).
Cover image: Premiere of Huntingtower, 1928, Regent Picture House, Renfield Street, Glasgow. Courtesy Scottish Screen Archive at National Library of Scotland.
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Trevor Griffiths is Reader in Economic and Social History at the University of Edinburgh. Educated at the University of Oxford, he has carried out research on working-class society in Britain in the early twentieth century, before turning more recently to examine aspects of popular culture. He was Co-Investigator on the three-year AHRC research project, 'Early Scottish Cinema, 1896-1927'.

Introduction; 1. From Variety Hall to Picture House: The Emergence of Scottish Cinema to 1914; 2. Regulating Scottish Cinema: Censorship and the Child Audience; 3. Through War and Peace: The Changing Fortunes of Scottish Silent Cinema, 1914-29; 4. A Seven-Day Wonder?: Cinema and the Scottish Sabbath; 5. An Essential Social Habit: Cinema-going in the early sound era, c.1927-39; 6. Beyond the Dream Palace: The Role of Non-Commercial Cinema in Scotland; 7. To the Summit and Beyond: Cinema-Going in the 1940s; 8. A Flickering Image: Scottish Film Production; Conclusion; Appendices; Bibliography.