Jay Dixon’s “History of English Romance Novels 1621–1975” (Chapter 1 in this volume) traces the emergence of modern popular romance fiction—first for contemporary romance novels (that is, works set in the time when they were written) and then for historical romances—from a matrix of other, related genres, such as amatory fiction, the domestic novel of manners, and sensation fiction, and it documents the contested reception of romance by critics, literary historians, and novelists from other, competing traditions. (13)
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This chapter is about [...] English (not British) romances. That is, it talks about only those romances set in England, and it ignores those set in the other countries of the United Kingdom and, with one or two exceptions, those written by non-English authors. (27-28)
Here's the description given in the Introduction:
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1