Edwardian era
| Periods in English history | |
|---|---|
| Roman Britain | Circa 43–410 |
| Anglo-Saxon | Circa 500–1066 |
| Norman | 1066–1154 |
| Plantagenet | 1154–1485 |
| Tudor | 1485–1603 |
| Elizabethan | 1558–1603 |
| Stuart | 1603–1714 |
| Jacobean | 1603–1625 |
| Carolean | 1625–1649 |
| (Interregnum) | 1649–1660 |
| Restoration | 1660–1688 |
| Georgian | 1714–1830 |
| Regency | 1830–1837 |
| Victorian | 1837–1901 |
| Edwardian | 1901–1914 |
| First World War | 1914–1918 |
| Interwar | 1918–1939 |
| Second World War | 1939–1945 |
| Postwar | 1945–1981 |
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Introduction
The Edwardian era is a period in the United Kingdom from 1901 to 1910, the reign of King Edward VII. It succeeded the Victorian era (1837 - 1901), and is sometimes extended to include the period up to the sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912, the start of World War I in 1914, or even the end of the war in 1918.
The successor of the Edwardian period is the "Golden Twenties".
In the Edwardian era, the British class system was at its most rigid. In art, the new style "Art Nouveau" flourished. The first comics were published. The period was also an important early milestone for the science fiction genre (e.g. H. G. Wells).
Spanking in the Edwardian era
Spanking was very common in the Edwardian era. Children were typically raised with great strictness and expected to show greatest cleanliness and discipline, both at home and at school. Corporal punishment was most commonly administered with a cane, on the child's buttocks or palms, although other spanking implements were also used, depending on the situation.
The sailor suit, which had become normal dress for both boys and girls in the 1870s, reached a new height of popularity in the Edwardian period.
Edwardian Erotica
Novels linking sexual arousal to corporal punishment, sadism, and femdom humiliation which began in the Victorian era came to full fruition in the Edwardian age. Hundreds of such books were published in England, France, and America. Nearly all were written anonymously or under pseudonyms.
British publisher and writer Charles Carrington was one of the most prominent and prolific publishers of underground erotica, printing richly illustrated limited editions in London, Paris, and Brussels (where he lived in exile from 1907 to 1912). He translated scores of French novels, particularly those of Hughues Rebell (aka Jean de Villiot), into English and often rewrote them to appeal to upper middle class English and American buyers who wanted books that were both intellectually respectable and risque.
With a few notable exceptions, such as Jean de Virgans' Esclaves Modernes (see booklist below), Edwardian punishment erotica, as in the 19th Century, arranged its characters according to age-old class divisions. The protagonists are nearly always from the educated upper classes. Typically, a randy aristocrat who goes "slumming" in flagellatory brothels and indulges in sex and whipping with his female servants and other working-class women he encounters in the story. The male-submissive femdom titles generally feature a wealthy, prominent man who is enslaved and degraded by a cruel, aristocratic dominatrix (following the model of Venus in Furs) or a common prostitute.
These novels were not created for or sold to the general public. They were not openly displayed in book stores. In this era, pornography was an exclusive vice of the well-to-do. Erotic books were usually produced in expensive limited editions and discreetly sold by private subscription to clients who could afford them. It was not until the mid-20th Century, with the advent of cheap, mass-produced paperbacks (along with changes in censorship laws), that reprints and contemporary stories in this genre became widely available.
Selected Works
- "Frank" and I (1902) by Anonymous. Originally published in three volumes in England. A wealthy young man, who is "a lover of the rod", takes in "Frank", a teenage girl disguised as a boy. Film adaptation: A 1983 film which recreated some of the caning and whipping scenes was released under the titles Frank and I and Lady Libertine.
- Les Flagellants et les flagellé s de Paris (1902) by Charles Virmaître. First published in Paris by Charles Carrington.
- Maud Cameron and her Guardian (1903) by Charles Sackville, (Golden Birch House: London). Author of numerous flagellation novels published in London and Paris including: Two Lascivious Adventures of Mr. Howard - A continuation of Maud Cameron and her Guardian (1907), The Amazing Chastisements of Miss Bostock (1908), Three Chapters in the Life of Mr. Howard (1908), Whipping as a Fine Art - Being an Account of Exquisite and Refined Chastisement Inflicted by Mr. Howard on Grown-up Schoolgirls (1909), et al.
- Woman and Her Master (1904) by Jean de Villiot, pseudonym of Georges Grassal - flagellation erotica translated into English by Charles Carrington from the original 1902 French edition, La Femme et son maître.
- Birch in the Boudoir (1905) by anonymous (attributed to Hugues Rebell, real name Georges Grassal), translated and published in Paris by Charles Carrington. Reprinted in 1989 by Blue Moon Books as Beauty in the Birch. An exchange of racy letters about the amatory and disciplinary experiences of a new master of an English school for wayward girls and a woman living in an Arabian harem.
- The Mistress and The Slave (1905) by George Merder - a study of female domination and sadomasochism as an upper-class businessman is enslaved and brutalized by a Parisian street-girl. Translated from the original French edition, La Maitresse et l'Esclave (Maison Mystere, ca. 1903).
- La Flagellation Passionnelle (1906) by Don Brennus Aléra, pseudonym of Roland Brévannes. Between 1903 and 1936 he wrote and illustrated around 100 historical and contemporary novels about flagellation and crossdressing petticoat punishment.
- Sadopaideia: Being the Experiences of Cecil Prendergast Undergraduate of the University of Oxford Shewing How he was Led Through the Pleasant Paths of Masochism to the Supreme joys of Sadism. (1907) by Anonymous. - Two-volume tale of a man who experiences both dominance and submission.
- The Beautiful Flagellants of New York (1907) by Lord Drialys [pseud.] (The Society of British Bibliophiles [Charles Carrington]: Paris) - follows an intrepid traveller's adventures from Chicago to Boston to New York. Originally published in three volumes, one for each city. Reprinted by Olympia Press as The Beautiful Flagellants of Chicago, Boston and New York.
- La Comtesse au fouet (1908) by Pierre Dumarchey (Pierre Mac Orlan). First published in 1906 as L.Homme-chien. The story of a cruel dominatrix who turns the male hero into a "dog-man". Under the pen-name Miss Sadie Blackeyes, he wrote many popular flagellation novels.
- The Way of a Man with a Maid (ca. 1908) by Anonymous. First published in France, exact date and author unknown. Three-volume Edwardian novel of abduction, sex and sadism. Often reprinted as a single volume under the shorter title A Man with a Maid. Film adaptation: In 2003 this was made into a spanking fetish film by Miss Marchmont called The Way of a Man and His Maid starring Leia-Ann Woods.
- Le education Anglaise (An English Education) (1908) by Lord Kidrodstock (Édition Parisienne: Paris) - early and unusual text featuring forced cross-dressing and flagellation. Boys and girls in an English boarding school are dressed alike in girl.s clothes including tight corsets and high-heeled boots.
- Esclaves Modernes (Modern Slaves) (1910) by Jean de Virgans, reprinted in 1922 with illustrations by Gaston Smit - unusual tale of power exchange with white European women whipped and abused by African natives. Virgans also wrote Flagellees in 1909.
- Two Flappers in Paris (ca. 1920s) by Anonymous. The flagellatory adventures of two English schoolgirls in France.
See also
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