The printing and distribution of obscene texts in early America is beginning to receive the attention this topic has deserved from bibliographers and cultural historians. Although scholarship remains hampered by a paucity of evidence, both of textual artifacts and of legal actions, the subject, as it relates to nineteenth-century New York City, has recently attracted significant attention from social historians. Some years ago in attempting to ameliorate the artifactual situation, I compiled a list of some 400 titles of “Risqué Literature published in America before 1877.” The following article manages to introduce some new material on the topic, particularly relating to the publication and the attendant legal troubles of distributers of early American editions of Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure. Even so, the evidence remains elusive, and I have had to draw important conclusions based only on experiences gained during a career of confronting historical American printing practices rather than on existing data.
BT - Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America IS - 2 LA - English N2 -The printing and distribution of obscene texts in early America is beginning to receive the attention this topic has deserved from bibliographers and cultural historians. Although scholarship remains hampered by a paucity of evidence, both of textual artifacts and of legal actions, the subject, as it relates to nineteenth-century New York City, has recently attracted significant attention from social historians. Some years ago in attempting to ameliorate the artifactual situation, I compiled a list of some 400 titles of “Risqué Literature published in America before 1877.” The following article manages to introduce some new material on the topic, particularly relating to the publication and the attendant legal troubles of distributers of early American editions of Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure. Even so, the evidence remains elusive, and I have had to draw important conclusions based only on experiences gained during a career of confronting historical American printing practices rather than on existing data.
PY - 2010 SP - 181 EP - 217 T2 - Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America TI - Printers and the Law: The Trials of Publishing Obscene Libel in Early America VL - 104 ER -