Submitted by DasherPack t3_ynww49 in todayilearned
The joke used to be "I only read Playboy for the articles", but in reality it had tons of great journalism, short fiction and very few pages of nudes. People were interspersing their wanks with political commentary with Playboy.
Basically. I mean, you had pulitzer/Nobel winners writing essays, and showing some bush.
Then Larry Flynt shows up with people pounding it out, showing clits & what not
> you had pulitzer/Nobel winners writing essays, and showing some bush.
You wouldn't think to look at him, but Norman Mailer had an incredible set of gams.
You're not wrong.
Hugh Hefner was generally trash person, & likely abuser. But that dude had great taste in authors/contributors
It's always weird to me because it's difficult to know how to feel about it, but yeah. The publisher Hugh Hefner did some amazing work, even though as a boss and a person he apparently was an utter asshole from all I can find on it.
And spread open pussies.
Penthouse mag too, iirc. Then Hustler arrived on the scene and it was all about the wanking from there on out.
Penthouse seemed to straddle the line with journalism but more nudes, more explicit nudes and "Penthouse Letters". Hustler leaned fully into porn and taboo humor.
Gotta have some good material when the post nut clarity kicks in
Also, for literally decades, they only showed bare breasts.
Turns out post nut clarity is amazing for reading about politics and understanding social commentary
The wisdom wank might have helped readers think clearly about important matters!
Isn’t that what people do on Reddit now? For you all know the very person replying to you could be guilty.
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Because that kind of obscenity was to be reserved for the real life British high society
Nonce island
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Pearl/Volume_18/Acrostic is my favorite. It is an acrostic: The first letter of every verse makes a phrase.
Jfc. I refuse to type what the “phrase” is in fear of getting a knock on the door from the FBI
It somehow makes the content of the poem even WORSE.
JFC
😳😳😳
Yikes. I was expecting something gross, but that was just creepy.
Yep, wow. Victorian literary porn.
Best title: "SUB-UMBRA, OR SPORT AMONG THE SHE-NOODLES"
She-noodles. I still don't know what that means.
noodle was slang for pretty girl.
I thought that was filler for the acrostic
Didn't know I was missing out on it by skipping it
The Aristocrats
If I know one thing about Victorian erotica it’s that flagellation will be heavily featured. I always wonder whether it was a genuinely more prevalent kink at the time, whether authors at the time just automatically assumed their audiences would want a whipping scene, or some combination of both.
Briching used to be a common punishment in schools back then. I wonder if that helped to influence tastes.
I had a paperback copy when I was younger. Lots of birch rods in those stories. Lots of birch rods.
“To the editor of The Pearl: A Magazine of Facetiae and Voluptuous Reading
Sir: I never though this would befall me …”
The Tale of Scrotie McBoogerballs must be the sfw version
As read by Morgan Freeman.
'Rampant engine of love' is a phrase new to me. I'm going to have many laughs reading these. My lesbian sensibilities are positively tickled.
Well, there’s a new fetish for me!
I am actually oddly addicted to reading The Pearl now. It's rather titillating.
This so vulgar and crass that I'm gonna jerk off to rule 34 just to wash the taste off my muff maraudor
How was it underground but printed @ Oxford?
Reprinted much later. You could get it in book form in the 20th Century. I had a copy.
I read a copy of The Pearl back in the early 80s. It was being circulated as "historical fiction." It was no more scandalous than the average Penthouse Letter to the Editor or story of the 80s.
The fiction magazine pearl was banned for writing about real life pearl necklaces.
I wonder if issue 11 was actually better than 12, like how Game of Thrones would always have the penultimate episode of the season be the banger while the season finale more or less dealt with the aftermath and set-up for the next season.
They had standards for obscenity!!??!! /s
This post brought up a memory of when i was like ten or eleven and my cousin had some edgy magazine, it wasnt like a playboy or anything but it definitely had some weird content, anyway it was just there in her room and I decided to look at it one day. The last few pages had an erotic story in it and it was about a guy who went to a female dom and she made him drink pee. That shit is still burned on my psyche because up until that point I don’t think i had read anything that weird before.
I read a copy of The Pearl when I was in middle school. Mines was written by John Steinbeck though.
to all publications
Wait until they hear about the royal family...
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It was sub-standard obscenity?
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I had a book with a bunch of the stories from this newsletter. Wild shit.
Had a copy of the book as a youngster in the seventies, (1970s). They compiled the whole thing. And, yes, I was using it for its intended purpose.
Like. I feel like I still could rub one off whilst reading about the dart of love all impatient to enter the mossy grotto between your thighs....
there’s a cool documentary on the black propaganda (sexual propaganda) unit the British very reluctantly ran during World War II. There is a female artist on it who tells a story about creating an image of Hitler with his penis out. She said the rather stuffy British offices directed her to draw it, then after a pause added ‘ don’t make it too large‘
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Can someone tell me what the fuck “simultaneously” means in the title?
They were simultaneously devoted to sex, incest, and flagellation?
The issues were simultaneously published?
“Three erotic tales simultaneously,”
r/Titlegore
That every issue had three serial stories at the same time.
Aha! Thank you, that makes sense.
I’m a little surprised it only lasted one year. I guess I assumed they could keep it under wraps longer
Did they promote rape, bestiality, incest, etc or just report on it?
FUCK YOU ,student
Gemmabeta t1_ivb3w7a wrote
> The topics depicted in the novels and poems were wide-ranging, including women's suffrage, physical disability, sexual impairment, secret sex societies, bestiality, India-rubber dildos, slave rape, duels, mock crucifixions, Turkish harems, and prophylactic devices. The Pearl often contained extensive political commentary, including references to the Reform Bills and Contagious Diseases Acts.
Back when people preferred to intersperse their wanking with deep discussions on the property requirement for voting.