Naughty 19th-Century weekly lowbrow tabloids

[grladams at teleport.com]

(book review reminded me of some threads thru the years on the P-list)

The Flash Press: Sporting Male Weeklies in 1840s New York (Historical
Studies of Urban America (Paperback) ) 
ISBN: 0226112349    EAN: 9780226112343  
 
Publisher: University of Chicago Press 
 
US SRP: $ 20.00 US  -  (Discount: REG)  
 
Binding: Paperback - Other Formats  
 
Pub Date: May 2008  
 
Contributor(s): Cline Cohen, Patricia (Author), Gilfoyle, Timothy J
(Author), Lefkowitz Horowitz, Helen (Author), American Antiquarian Society
(With)  
  
Publisher Marketing:
Obscene, libidinous, loathsome, lascivious. Those were just some of the
ways critics described the nineteenth-century weeklies that covered and
publicized New York City's extensive sexual underworld. Publications like
the "Flash "and the" Whip"--distinguished by a captivating brew of lowbrow
humor and titillating gossip about prostitutes, theater denizens, and
sporting events--were not the sort generally bound in leather for future
reference, and despite their popularity with an enthusiastic readership,
they quickly receded into almost complete obscurity. Recently, though, two
sizable collections of these papers have resurfaced, and in "The Flash
Press" three renowned scholars provide a landmark study of their
significance as well as a wide selection of their ribald articles and
illustrations. 
Including short tales of urban life, editorials on prostitution, and
moralizing rants against homosexuality, these selections epitomize a
distinct form of urban journalism,"" Here, in addition to providing a
thorough overview of this colorful reportage, its editors, and its
audience, the authors examine nineteenth-century ideas of sexuality and
freedom that mixed Tom Paine's republicanism with elements of the Marquis
de Sade's sexual ideology. They also trace the evolution of censorship and
obscenity law, showing how a string of legal battles ultimately led to the
demise of the flash papers: editors were hauled into court, sentenced to
jail for criminal obscenity and libel, and eventually pushed out of
business. But not before they forever changed the debate over public
sexuality and freedom of expression in America's most important city. 

Review Quotes:
"A fascinating survey of the long-forgotten flash' newspapers of the 1840s
and of the raucous urban sexual cultures, explosive sexual scandals, and
heated debates over sexual liberty and morality those newspapers
chronicled, provoked, and lampooned."-George Chauncey, author of Gay New
York 

Review Quotes:
"Cohen, Gilfoyle and Horowitz, history professors and chroniclers of
19th-century American sexuality, offer an engaging scholarly examination of
the little-known weekly newspapers that reported on the sexual underworld
of 1840s New York. . . . A thorough account of this quirky, salacious
moment in journalism, readers familiar with New York will find a city both
foreign and familiar, and a sense that the local weekly used to be a lot
more fun." 

--------------------------------------------------------------------
mail2web.com - Microsoft® Exchange solutions from a leading provider -
http://link.mail2web.com/Business/Exchange