The Kensington Ladies' Erotica Society was an erotica writers' group founded in Kensington, California in 1999 whose aims were to create erotica literature written for and by women. The group became the first to publish collections on sexuality for the middle-aged woman. [1] Founded by Sabina Sedgewick, members also included: Rose Solomon, Bernadette Vaughan, Nell Port, and Elvira Pearson (all pseudonyms).
Sabina Sedgewick at the time was a librarian cataloging erotica for UC Berkeley's Bancroft Library. She found herself speculating whether women found erotic literature as appealing as did men. She asked this question aloud at a New Year's faculty party at her home and future member, Nell Port, encouraged her to form a group to address that question. When the group first began meeting, participants were in their 40s. Most were married. Some were homemakers and others had day jobs. [1] They originally began as an erotic reading group, however, after dutifully reading Anaïs Nin, Henry Miller, Nancy Friday and others, along with Penthouse , Playboy and Chic, the newly formed group decided that none of it spoke to contemporary American women. Sabina urged them to try their hand at writing their own erotic fantasies. [2] The group would meet monthly, sharing their poems, short stories, recipes, and more.
Although not originally intending to publish, member Rose Solomon accumulated the group's writings, and by 1983 there was enough for their first book, Ladies' Home Erotica. It became a best-seller. [1]
The 10 original members (now seven due to two moving away and one dying) were considered pioneers of female erotica. The group has published 3 more collections of their erotica. Now, documents of the Society have been collected and archived at San José State University. [3] [4]
Kensington is an unincorporated community and census designated place located in the Berkeley Hills, in the East Bay, part of the San Francisco Bay Area, in Contra Costa County, California. In the 20th century it was considered part of Berkeley, although it is across the county line. House numbers follow the pattern used in Berkeley, and Kensington shares two zip codes with the Berkeley Hills area.
Virgin Books is a British book publisher 90% owned by the publishing group Random House, and 10% owned by Virgin Group, the company originally set up by Richard Branson as a record company.
Erotic literature, or literotica, comprises fictional and factual stories and accounts of eros intended to arouse similar feelings in readers. This contrasts erotica, which focuses more specifically on sexual feelings. Other common elements are satire and social criticism. Much erotic literature features erotic art, illustrating the text.
Susannah Bright is an American feminist, author and journalist, often on the subject of politics and sexuality.
Enchanted April is a 1991 British film directed by Mike Newell. The screenplay by Peter Barnes was adapted from Elizabeth von Arnim's 1922 novel The Enchanted April. It stars Miranda Richardson, Josie Lawrence, Polly Walker, and Joan Plowright, with Alfred Molina, Michael Kitchen, and Jim Broadbent in supporting roles.
Laura Antoniou is an American novelist. She is the author of The Marketplace series of BDSM-themed novels, which were originally published under the pen name of Sara Adamson.
Erotic photography is a style of art photography of an erotic, sexually suggestive or sexually provocative nature.
Toyen, was a Czech painter, drafter, and illustrator and a member of the surrealist movement.
Cleis Press is an American independent publisher of books in the areas of sexuality, erotica, feminism, gay and lesbian studies, gender studies, fiction, and human rights. The press was founded in 1980 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. It later moved to San Francisco and was based out of Berkeley until its purchase by Start Media in 2014. Its founders were Frédérique Delacoste, Felice Newman and Mary Winfrey Trautmann, who collectively financed, wrote and published the press's first book Fight Back: Feminist Resistance to Male Violence in 1981. In 1987, they published Sex Work: Writings by Women in the Sex Industry by Delacoste with Priscilla Alexander.
Cecilia Tan is an American writer, editor, sexuality activist, and founder and manager of Circlet Press, which specializes in science fiction erotica, a once uncommon genre; its publications often feature BDSM themes. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.[1] She also writes about baseball, but is not to be confused with a writer of the same name who specializes in Asian cookbooks.
Rachel Kramer Bussel is an American author, columnist, and editor, specializing in erotica. She previously studied at the New York University School of Law and earned her bachelor's degree in political science and women's studies from the University of California, Berkeley.
Women's erotica is any erotic material that caters specifically to women target-demographic of various sexual preferences. When erotica is specifically directed at lesbians, it is referred to as lesbian erotica. Women's erotica is available from a variety of media including video games, websites, books, comics, short stories, films, photography, magazines, hentai and audio. The content may cover many aspects of sexuality, from relationships to fetishes; the main idea being to convey sex-positivism from a woman's perspective, or to feature female empowerment and sexual fantasies.
Sir William Russell Flint was a Scottish artist and illustrator who was known especially for his watercolours of women. He also worked in oils, tempera, and printmaking.
Charles Carrington (1857–1921) was a leading British publisher of erotica in late-19th- and early-20th-century Europe. Born Paul Harry Ferdinando in Bethnal Green, England on 11 November 1867, he moved in 1895 from London to Paris where he published and sold books in the rue Faubourg Montmartre and rue de Chateaudun; for a short period he moved his activities to Brussels. Carrington also published works of classical literature, including the first English translation of Aristophanes' "Comedies," and books by famous authors such as Oscar Wilde and Anatole France, in order to hide his "undercover" erotica publications under a veil of legitimacy. His books featured the erotic art of Martin van Maële. He published a French series La Flagellation a Travers le Monde mainly on English flagellation, identifying it as an English predilection.
Alison Tyler is the pseudonym of an American author, editor and publisher of erotica living in Northern California. She has authored over 20 explicit novels, hundreds of short stories and has edited more than 60 erotic anthologies. She runs her own publishing company, Pretty Things Press . Tired of getting mixed up with the porn actress with the same name, she now blogs on Patreon as Alison Trollop.
The Private Case is a collection of erotica and pornography held initially by the British Museum and then, from 1973, by the British Library. The collection began between 1836 and 1870 and grew from the receipt of books from legal deposit, from the acquisition of bequests and, in some cases, from requests made to the police following their seizures of obscene material.
Lori Perkins is an American literary agent, book publisher and author. In 2012, she founded Riverdale Avenue Books, an e-book publishing company, in Riverdale, Bronx.
Victorian erotica is a genre of sexual art and literature which emerged in the Victorian era of 19th-century Britain. Victorian erotica emerged as a product of a Victorian sexual culture. The Victorian era was characterized by paradox of rigid morality and anti-sensualism, but also by an obsession with sex. Sex was a main social topic, with progressive and enlightened thought pushing for sexual restriction and repression. Overpopulation was a societal concern for the Victorians, thought to be the cause of famine, disease, and war. To curb the threats of overpopulation and to solve other social issues that were arising at the time, sex was socially regulated and controlled. New sexual categories emerged as a response, defining normal and abnormal sex. Heterosexual sex between married couples became the only form of sex socially and morally permissible. Sexual pleasure and desire beyond heterosexual marriage was labelled as deviant, considered to be sinful and sinister. Such deviant forms included masturbation, homosexuality, prostitution and pornography. Procreation was the primary goal of sex, removing it from the public, and placing it in the domestic. Yet, Victorian anti-sexual attitudes were contradictory of genuine Victorian life, with sex underlying much of the cultural practice. Sex was simultaneously repressed and proliferated. Sex was featured in medical manuals such as The Sexual Impulse by Havelock Ellis and Functions and Disorders of Reproductive Organs by William Acton, and in cultural magazines like The Penny Magazine and The Rambler. Sex was popular in entertainment, with much of Victorian theatre, art and literature including and expressing sexual and sensual themes.
A. R. Morlan was an American author of novels and short stories whose works of fiction have appeared in various magazines and anthologies. She wrote in a number of genres, including horror, science fiction, vampire, erotica, and gay erotica.
Tiffany Reisz is an American author. She is best known for the Original Sinners series of erotica and she has won the RITA Award and a Lambda Literary Award.