Erotic literature

Erotic literature comprises fictional and factual stories and accounts of eros (passionate, romantic or sexual relationships) intended to arouse similar feelings in readers.

Although cultural disapproval of erotic literature has always existed, its circulation was not seen as a major problem before the invention of printing, as the costs of producing individual manuscripts limited distribution to a very small group of wealthy and literate readers.

The invention of printing, in the 15th century, brought with it both a greater market and increasing restrictions, including censorship and legal restraints on publication on the grounds of obscenity.

[3] The oldest located love poem is Istanbul 2461,[4] an erotic monologue written by a female speaker directed to king Shu-Sin.

[11] Erotic poems continued to be written in Hellenistic and Roman times by writers like Automedon (The Professional and Demetrius the Fortunate), Philodemus (Charito) and Marcus Argentarius.

Notable Roman erotic poets included Catullus, Propertius, Tibullus, Ovid, Martial and Juvenal, and the anonymous Priapeia.

Though many of the poems attributed to Rochester were actually by other authors, his reputation as a libertine was such that his name was used as a selling point by publishers of collections of erotic verse for centuries after.

This poem was being censored from collections of Rochester's poetry as late as 1953, though, in line with the subsequent general change in attitudes to sexuality, it was dramatised as a scene in the film The Libertine about his life, based on an existing play.

One of the 19th century's foremost poets—Algernon Charles Swinburne—devoted much of his considerable talent to erotic verse, producing, inter alia, twelve eclogues on flagellation titled The Flogging Block "by Rufus Rodworthy, annotated by Barebum Birchingly";[19] more was published anonymously in The Whippingham Papers (c. 1888).

[23] Pierre Louÿs helped found a literary review, La Conque in 1891,[24] where he proceeded to publish Astarte—an early collection of erotic verse already marked by his distinctive elegance and refinement of style.

He called one collection of poems Pansies partly for the simple ephemeral nature of the verse but also a pun on the French word panser, to dress or bandage a wound.

[citation needed] From the age of 17, Gavin Ewart acquired a reputation for wit and accomplishment through such works as "Phallus in Wonderland" and "Poems and Songs", which appeared in 1939 and was his first collection.

The intelligence and casually flamboyant virtuosity with which he framed his often humorous commentaries on human behaviour made his work invariably entertaining and interesting.

In the 19th century, the sensational journalism of W. T. Stead's The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon (1885) about the procuring of underage girls into the brothels of Victorian London provided a stimulus for the erotic imagination.

Stead's account was widely translated and the revelation of "padded rooms for the purpose of stifling the cries of the tortured victims of lust and brutality" and the symbolic figure of "The Minotaur of London" confirmed European observers worst imaginings about "Le Sadisme anglais" and inspired erotic writers to write of similar scenes set in London or involving sadistic English gentlemen.

[28] Well-known recent works in this genre are The Happy Hooker: My Own Story (1971) by the Dutch madame Xaviera Hollander and The Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl (2005) by Belle de Jour.

There is anecdotal evidence that, as late as the mid-20th century, sex therapists and other physicians prescribed erotic literature as treatment for erectile dysfunction.

[citation needed] The ancient Chinese versions of the sex manual include the texts that contain the Taoist sexual practices.

Squeezing sphincter while semi-erect or fully erect dozens of times daily, particularly a few hours before intercourse will help delay orgasm or enhance non-ejaculatory pleasure.

The Universal Tao system was developed by Mantak Chia to teach Taoist meditative and exercise techniques to balance the body and increase and refine one's vital energy, or qi.

Some were created as a form of satire or social criticism, as in the case of a mock-sex manual produced in the early sixteenth century by Pietro Aretino.

Prosecutions of books for their erotic content alone were rare and works which attacked the church or state gave much more concern to the authorities than erotica or 'obscene libel' as it was then known.

For instance the Licensing Act 1662 was aimed generally at "heretical, seditious, schismatical or offensive books of pamphlets" rather than just erotica per se.

The first conviction for obscenity in England occurred in 1727, when Edmund Curll was fined for the publication of Venus in the Cloister or The Nun in her Smock under the common law offence of disturbing the King's peace.

It was passed on the assurance by the Lord Chief Justice that it was "intended to apply exclusively to works written for the single purpose of corrupting the morals of youth and of a nature calculated to shock the common feelings of decency in any well-regulated mind."

In the United Kingdom the Obscene Publications Act 1959 provided for the protection of "literature" but conversely increased the penalties against pure "pornography."

The new definition read: [A]n article shall be deemed to be obscene if its effect or (where the article comprises two or more distinct items) the effect of any one of its items is, if taken as a whole, such as to tend to deprave and corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or hear the matter contained or embodied in it.After this piece of legislation questions of the literary merit of the work in question were allowed to be put before the judge and jury as in the Lady Chatterley trial.

However, in October 2008, a man was unsuccessfully prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act (the R v Walker trial) for posting fictional written material to the Internet allegedly describing the kidnap, rape and murder of the pop group Girls Aloud.