#300336 - Five Men Tiffany Boots Victorian erotica ebook
Five Men
six short stories by Tiffany Boots
Royal Press
London, England
1905
digital replica
The male author of Five Men provides a short introduction in which he sets his first acquaintance with his stories in the smoking salon of an around-the-world cruise ship. There, strangers exchange tales of adventure with women. Set in 1901, the year Queen Victoria died, raconteurs remember their pleasures with warmth and affection toward the females involved. They praise the ladies of sensuous interludes, recalling sweet exploits with fond nostalgia.
Five worldly, cosmopolitan, wise and sophisticated characters told fascinating tales the author retold to his friends. “ . . . they have prevailed upon me to tell them in type for a select and discreet distribution among the coterie of good fellows and ‘Men About Town’ in this old London town.”
In those days, erotic fiction was a province visited only by those affluent, Londontown fellows who could afford it and knew who sold it. Not a good old boys club but a big clique of high-hat sex cognoscenti who appreciated rare flavors, fragrances, textures and grace that only titillated femininity might provide. The accounts tell of cheerful encounters between enlightened hedonists and beauties from various levels of society, the yielding women with whom they share gourmet satisfaction.
Six stories —
Max Belford’s Story
The lodger witnesses the bawdy shenanigans of Mr. Claude with his wife and daughters, often involving flogging. Max orchestrates the husband's absence with a theater ticket, making the wife available for bedroom escapades. During their night, she tells him about her husband's expedition into the charms of their widowed maid.
The Diplomat’s Story
In Paris, a man recognizes Virginia and daughter Rose when they shoplift at a posh department store. He encounters them again when they visit his quarters seeking donations for a fraudulent charity. Attracted by their loveliness, he offers the pair a choice of acquiescence to his desires or public exposure of their misdeeds. On their knees, with skirts up, he spanks both bottoms, which stimulates everyone. He has his way with each beauty through a long matinee, and both ladies wind up demanding more of his personal attention.
Jack Pace’s Story
In a Norfolk movie theater, Jack sits himself next to young Helen, whose husband has been at sea. After dinner, he takes her to his photo studio and makes pictures of the pretty newlywed, in and out of teddies. Thoroughly-modern Jack uses a Sani-Capsule, Love Drops, K-Y jelly (invented in 1904) and Vaseline to facilitate their pleasure.
The Frenchmen’s Story
Told in third-person voice, the tale unfolds like a dreamy legend — irresistible attraction between young lovers separated by propriety. Or were they? Lithe Camille imagines heat of breathless passion with the brawny vagrant she sees from her bedroom window. At night, he opens her tin shutters and the couple flush with lust and sweet kisses.
Dr. R – – 's Story
A specialist in women's conditions, Dr. R is summoned to the home of beautiful Baroness Z—. She complains of the absence of children from her marriage. The doctor soon discovers that the Baron errs in his approach to his wife, and sets about taking these delightful matters into his own hands. He introduces the Baroness to sensuous intercourse, to which she gleefully responds.
The Parson’s Daughter
Suzanne beseeches Dr. R– for help with an urgent development, a consequence of incestuous liaison with her father. The doctor visits him and agrees to perform surgical relief in exchange for free access to three daughters. Wine and dance invigorate a salacious soiree at the parsonage.
As possible, type faces were matched to the old British fonts shown on book pages. Headers, page numbers, chapter headings and page proportions in the ebook were conformed to reflect
those of the old book.
All chapters begin on odd numbered pages in both the original and the ebook. As a consequence, a few pages are blank.
Pictures of typical pages appear at the end of the volume.
The brightness and contrast of photographs were adjusted and plate related specks re-touched. Most photos have unpleasant grain or texture, but zooming reveals little additional dissonance.
Pictures that require the reader to turn the book were rotated 90°. Images are cropped to include a small amount of the blank paper that surrounds them on pages.
The title page promises 20 copper plates (i.e., pictures). The pages are conscientiously numbered and none are missing. The volume contains 19 pictures.
Photographs are located in the ebook near the text that abuts them in the paper version. It's likely that the pictures were derived from sources unrelated to the author or publisher of Five Men. Some pictures have borders; others don't. The narrative content of the photos have only vague connection to the prose.
All new scans of the 1905 hardback book. Female and male nudity; penetration.
The book has dark blue cloth covering the boards. Printed and bound in signatures, the essential binding was accomplished by four thick staples that show little deterioration.
The text was completely re-set for the ebook version. Few changes were made to the text. English spelling is mostly retained. Some punctuation was revised. 34,000 words.
As a whole, punctuation is underutilized in the text. Sentences and paragraphs are long and commas rare. Only chapter three encloses dialog with quotation marks.
The absence of routine paragraphing and punctuation may have been an economy tactic, as the type was probably set by hand. Fewer pieces of lead meant less time composing pages. Also, the text might fit on fewer pages (reducing the cost of paper for the project) with the omission of punctuation and limited paragraphing.
This Victorian erotic fiction exposes intimate male exploits using women as fleshly gymnasiums at which to exercise lust. Short words add vulgar spice to a restrained, sometimes metaphorical vocabulary that describes the apparel, accoutrements, anatomy, action and ablutions of ecstasy between these men of the world and the women they encounter by chance.
Photographs embedded in the text seem to have been produced under circumstances that work against art or even quality. Basic pornographic tableaux show a standard assortment of plumbing, proximity and connection. These images may have been sensational in their age but today they present more as an aggregation of deficiencies than as erotic imagery. Nonetheless, they delivered sensational goods within limitations of available technology then.
A few pictures have an assortment of textiles in the frame: upholstery, curtains, rugs. The mix of these patterns on fabric mirrors contemporaneous Matisse paintings, whose scenes and figures were often trimmed with colorful, repetitive designs.
The ebook captures the timbre of the original volume, but enables readers to make letters on pages as large as desired, facilitating screen zooms of photos. The oldest book we've converted to digital form, Five Men was last re-printed in 1969 by venerable Grove Press but without pictures. Now, it's a carefully crafted ebook, designed with respect for back-room purveyors of “gentlemen's” curiosa at the turn-of-the-century.
NOTE:
Although some parts of pictures are obscured
on this page, the ebook shows everything that's
in the original.
One ebook, delivered by download from your 30th Street Graphics account.