SEX

[Mary Whitehouse, campaigner against the ‘permissive society’, founder and president of the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association.] Two Autograph Notes Signed on compliments slips, and her ‘New Address’ in Autograph.

Author: 
Mary Whitehouse [née Constance Mary Hutcheson] (1910-2001), campaigner against the ‘permissive society’, founder and president of the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association
Publication details: 
None of the items dated, but from the 1960s or 1970s.
£100.00

A controversial figure much-ridiculed by the media, but nevertheless wielding considerable influence. See her entry in the Oxford DNB. All three items in good condition. Items 1 and 2 are 11.5 x 9 cm compliments slips for ‘The Secretary’ of the National Viewers' and Listeners' Association, with the address in the bottom left-hand corner: ‘MRS. MARY WHITEHOUSE | Triangle Farm House | Far Forest | Nr. KIDDERMINSTER | Worcs.’ and her phone number at bottom right. ONE: ‘The Secretary’ crossed out by Whitehouse and replaced with her signature ‘Mary Whitehouse’. Autograph message: ‘In haste.

[Emilia Francis, Lady Dilke, and her adulterous husband Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke.] Autograph Signatures ('Charles W. Dilke' and 'Emilia F. S. Dilke'), made together for an autograph hunter after the Crawford Scandal.

Author: 
Emilia Francis, Lady Dilke [née Strong] (1840-1904), English author, art historian, feminist and trade unionist; her second husband Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke (1843-1911), Radical Liberal politician
Publication details: 
Dated by Lady Dilke 'Newham | 10 June | 1891'.
£120.00

1p., 12mo. In fair condition, lightly aged. Reads: 'Charles W. Dilke. | Emilia F. S. Dilke | Newnham | 10 June | 1891'. Written after the celebrated Crawford Scandal of 1886, which resulted in Dilke losing his seat in parliament, and becoming a music-hall figure of fun as a result of the revelations of his adulterous behaviour.

[Sex Education late 1930s; Pamphlet] Programme of Lectures to be held at Conway Hall

Author: 
The Sex Education Society. President Norman Haire.
Publication details: 
"Tuesday January 11th" 1938 [Season October 1937-April 1938]
£120.00

Pamphlet, not paginated [12pp. inc. printed wraps, 8vo], stapled, very good condition. It contains the Programme of Lectures (Transvestism, Sex Education, Changes in Family Life in the USSR, Fetishism, the Birth-Rate), advertisements for related literature, objectives (birth control, V.D. etc.), and objects ("Appliances for Birth Control and Sex Hygiene"), "Aims and Objects of the Sex Education Society" (one page), and Membership form (blank).

Manuscript anonymous contemporary ribald spoof titled 'Mrs. Pankhursts Address to the Suffragettes'. [With two small photographs (one of Emmeline Pankhurst and the other of Sylvia Pankhurst?).]

Author: 
Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928), British political activist and leader of the suffragette movement [female suffrage; Victorian humour; sexuality; social history]
Publication details: 
Without date or place. [England, 1890s?]
£250.00

1p., 12mo. In good condition, on aged and worn paper, folded twice. Written in a late Victorian or Edwardian hand. The 'Address' is an interesting survival: the sort of ribald saloon-bar joke through which male opponents of the movement sought to tame it through ridicule. Similar examples survive, attributed to Lady Astor speaking in parliament, but this version clearly predates these. Here is a transcript of what is a concentrated dose of double-entendre: 'Mrs.

Five Autograph Letters Signed (one 'Alex Comfort' and four 'Alex C') from the poet and sexologist Alex Comfort to John Rogers, regarding poetry, including a discussion of whether poetry is 'finding a language in England, rather than losing one!'

Author: 
Alex Comfort [Alexander Comfort] (1920-2000), poet, novelist, doctor and sexologist
Publication details: 
Three from Havengrove, Tudor Road, Barnet; one on letterhead of Chase Farm Hospital, Enfield, and another on letterhead of the Royal Waterloo Hospital, London. All undated [c.1942]
£320.00

Item One: From Havengrove. On reverse of printed 12mo prospectus for the first issue of 'Poetry Folios' magazine (which appeared in 1942), edited by Comfort and Peter Wells. 1p., 12mo. Fair, on aged and creased paper. He thanks him for his letter. 'It is appreciation of this kind that makes one want to go on writing. [...] I wish I could meet you.' Item Two: From Havengrove, on letterhead of 'Poetry Folios'. Undated. 2pp., 12mo. Fair, on lightly-creased and aged paper.

Autograph Letter Signed ['J. Arthur Thomson'] to an unnamed firm of publishers.

Author: 
Sir John Arthur Thomson (1861-1933), Professor of Natural History at the University of Aberdeen, 1899-1930
Publication details: 
10 August 1914; his letterhead from the Natural History Department, Marischal College, The University, Aberdeen.
£100.00

One page, octavo. On aged paper, with slight chipping to corners, but text clear and entire. He is afraid that he 'did not answer your second letter in regard to a book on Sex.' 'After careful consideration', Thomas and 'Prof. Geddes' [Sir Patrick Geddes, 1854-1932] have come to the conclusion that 'if we wrote another book on that subject it should be published either by "Walter Scott" (who has 'The Evolution of Sex') or by Williams and Norgate (who have 'Sex')' [both books, 1889 and 1914 respectively, also by Geddes and Thomson].

Amativeness: or, evils and remedies of excessive and perverted sexuality; including warning and advice to the married and single.

Author: 
O. S. Fowler
Publication details: 
John Heywood, Deansgate and Ridgefield, Manchester; and 11, Paternoster Buildings, 1884.
£36.00

Thirty-two pages. Octavo. In original light-blue illustrated printed wraps. A scarce item, in frail condition, with the wraps worn, spotted and frayed, particularly at the spine. Closed tears to reverse of wraps, which is stamped 'MAY BE HAD OF J.S. CROPLEY, WINDSOR'. Rust staining from staples. Internally sound, tight and generally clean, with bottom outside corner dogeared. Ownership inscription of Tom Rowland Kent.

My friend Henry Miller.

Author: 
Alfred Perles
Publication details: 
London: Neville Spearman, 1955.
£120.00

8vo. Pages: xi + 242. 11 plates. Good, despite one bump at head of back board. Dustwrapper good, despite fraying at head and tail of spine and show-through sellotape discolouration . Dustjacket discoloration to free endpapers. Neat inscription, presumably by Perles, in green ink on front free endpaper 'To | Jack Mitchell | from Alfred Perles | & | Henry Miller | London March, 56.'

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