Includes bibliographical references and index

Preface: The Formation of a Panoramaniac -- Introduction: Moving Panorama - a Missing Medium -- The Incubation Era: Antecedents and Anticipations -- Large as Life, and Moving: The Peristrephic Panorama -- Rolling Across the Stage: The Moving Panorama and the Theatre -- Transformed By The Light: The Diorama and the "dioramas" -- The Panoramania, or The Mid-Century Moving Panorama Craze -- Panoramania in Practice: Albert Smith and his Moving Panoramas -- The Moving Panorama Performance: an Excavation -- Intermedial Tug of War, or Panoramas and Magic Lanterns -- Sensory Bombardment: a Medium's Final Fanfares -- The Discursive Transfiguration of the Moving Panorama -- Conclusion: From Panoramas to Media Culture.