Mother Clap's Molly House: The Gay Subculture in England 1700-1830

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Both informatiave and outrageous
Well informed and witty

Mother Clap's Molly House: The Gay Subculture in England 1700-1830
Rictor Norton
Manufacturer: GMP Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Many authors could have taken the same material and produced a ponderously dull tome of purely academic interest, or a polemic for the disaffected. Despite the obvious depth of his understanding of the subject material, Norton manages to write in an easy, accessible style with frequent flashes of real wit.

In August 1934, young Cyril L. wrote to his friend Billy about all the exciting men he had met, the swinging nightclubs he had visited, and the vibrant new life he had forged for himself in the big city. He wrote, "I have only been queer since I came to London about two years ago, before then I knew nothing about it." London, for Cyril, meant boundless opportunities to explore his newfound sexuality. But his freedom was limite: he was soon arrested, simply for being in a club frequented by queer men.

Cyril's story is Matt Houlbrook's point of entry into the queer worlds of early twentieth-century London. Drawing on previously unknown sources, from police reports and newspaper exposés to personal letters, diaries, and the first queer guidebook ever written, Houlbrook here explores the relationship between queer sexualities and modern urban culture that we take for granted today. He revisits the diverse queer lives that took hold in London's parks and streets; its restaurants, pubs, and dancehalls; and its Turkish bathhouses and hotels—as well as attempts by municipal authorities to control and crack down on those worlds. He also describes how London shaped the culture and politics of queer life—and how London was in turn shaped by the lives of queer men. Ultimately, Houlbrook unveils the complex ways in which men made sense of their desires and who they were. In so doing, he mounts a sustained challenge to conventional understandings of the city as a place of sexual liberation and a unified queer culture.

A history remarkable in its complexity yet intimate in its portraiture, Queer London is a landmark work that redefines queer urban life in England and beyond.

“A ground-breaking work. While middle-class lives and writing have tended to compel the attention of most historians of homosexuality, Matt Houlbrook has looked more widely and found a rich seam of new evidence. It has allowed him to construct a complex, compelling account of interwar sexualities and to map a new, intimate geography of London.”—Matt Cook, The Times Higher Education Supplement

Winner of History Today’s Book of the Year Award, 2006

Sodom on the Thames reconstructs these incidents in rich detail and gives a voice to the diverse people involved. It deepens our understanding of late Victorian attitudes toward urban culture, masculinity, and male homoeroticism. Kaplan also explores the implications of such historical narratives for the contemporary politics of sexuality.

Originally published in 1950, this account of life among female Free French soldiers in a London barracks during World War II sold four million copies in the United States alone and many more millions worldwide.

The novel is based on the real-life experiences of the author, Tereska Torres, who escaped from occupied France. She arrived as a refugee in London and joined other exiles enlisting in Charles de Gaulle's army, then stationed in Britain awaiting an invasion of their homeland by Allied forces. But Women's Barracks is no ordinary war story. The grim world of an urban military barracks became the setting for one of the steamiest novels of its time. Leaving "normal" civilian life behind, the women enter an all-female realm, where passionate attachments soon form-between older, experienced women and young innocents, between butch officer types and their femmes subordinates. And for those with more traditional leanings, there was a city full of soldiers to be had- sometimes two or three at a time.

As the Blitz rains down over London, taboos are broken, affairs start and stop and hearts are won and lost. Torres dutifully relates the erotic adventures of her comrades with an equal sympathy toward straight and gay relationships that was unusual for its time.

Despite a tone that is frank rather than lurid, Women's Barracks was banned for obscenity in several states. It was also denounced by the House Select Committee on Current Pornographic Materials in 1952 as an example of how the paperback industry was "promoting moral degeneracy." But in spite of such efforts-or perhaps, in part, because of them-the novel became a record-breaking bestseller and inspired a whole new genre: lesbian pulp.

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Parents, listen!
The Place to Start
beyond tv land
Great book, reference
A Must Read!

Runaway Me: Survivor's Story
Evan K. Cutler
Manufacturer: A Blooming Pr Co
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

The most useful part of the bookis the reference section. Mr. Cutler has included references for parents and teenagers, runaways and those who know someone who has runaway. Every person who works with children - especially with adolescents - should have a copy of this book.