Colin Dickey invites you into the world of early 20th century mail-order erotica.
In order to evade post office censors, smut peddlers like Panurge Press and Falstaff Press were obligated to dress up their offerings with a veneer of scientific dross, resulting in works that were too smutty to be of any real scientific or sociological value, and yet too riddled with academic nonsense to be properly erotic. A curiously forgotten and nearly nonsensical sub-genre, these books exist in between the finely-drawn lines of obscenity and free speech, pornography and literature, and titillation and scientific inquiry. Colin will share the history of these odd publishers and choice examples from his library, including works like White Meat, Praeputii Incisio, Black Opium, The Sword and Womankind, and An Anthropological Cabinet of Curiosities.