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The centre of the trade in such material in England at
this period was Holywell Street, off the Strand, London.
An important publisher of erotic material in the early
19th century was George Cannon (1789–1854), followed in
mid-century by William Dugdale (1800–1868) and John
Camden Hotten (1832–1873).
An important and entertaining conspectus and evaluation
of 19th century (pre-1885) and earlier underground
erotica, from the author's own private archive, is
provided by Victorian writer Henry Spencer Ashbee in his
bibliographical trilogy Index Librorum Prohibitorum
(1877), Centuria Librorum Absconditorum (1879) and
Catena Librorum Tacendorum (1885). His plot summaries of
the works he discusses in these privately printed
volumes are themselves a contribution to the genre.
Originally of very limited circulation, changing
attitudes have led to his work now being widely
available.
Notable European works of erotica at this time were
Gamiani, or Two Nights of Excess (1833) by Frenchman
Alfred de Musset and Venus in Furs (1870) by the
Austrian author Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. The
latter erotic novella brought the attention of the world
to the phenomenon of masochism, named after the author.
Towards the end of the century, a more "cultured" form
of erotica began to appear by such as the poet Algernon
Charles Swinburne who pursued themes of paganism,
lesbianism and sado-masochism in such works as Lesbia
Brandon and in contributions to The Whippingham Papers
(1888) edited by St George Stock, author of The Romance
of Chastisement (1866). This was associated with the
Decadent movement, in particular, with Aubrey Beardsley
and the Yellow Book. But it was also to be found in
France, amongst such writers as Pierre Louys, author of
Les chansons de Bilitis (1894) (a celebration of
lesbianism and sexual awakening).
Pioneering works of male homosexual erotica from this
time were The Sins of the Cities of the Plain
(1881), which features the celebrated Victorian
transvestite duo of Boulton and Park as characters,
and Teleny, or The Reverse of the Medal (1893).
Important publishers of erotic fiction at the end of the
19th century and the beginning of the twentieth were
Leonard Smithers (1861–1907) and Charles Carrington
(1867–1921), both of whom were subject to legal
injunctions from the British authorities in order to
prohibit their trade in such material. Because of this
legal harassment the latter conducted his business from
Paris.[56] Erotic fiction published by Carrington at
this period includes Raped on the Railway: a True Story
of a Lady who was first ravished and then flagellated on
the Scotch Express (1894) and The
Memoirs of Dolly Morton (1899) set on a slave-plantation
in the Southern States of America.
Erotic Literature - The 20th century
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