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Das Dekameron, by Giovanni Baccaccio, illustrated by F. v. Bayros. With a foreword by Hanns Heinz Ewers (Wilhelm Borngräber Verlag, Berlin., 1913) 5.25"x7.5", 612pp + 4 pages of ads, hardcover, half buckram with gilt title and decorations, very good condition. German language of Boccaccio's Decameron with 6 illustrations by Franz von Bayros. The Decameron, (subtitled Prencipe Galeotto or Prince Galehaut), is a collection of novellas by the 14th-century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio (1313–1375). The book is structured as a frame story containing 100 tales told by a group of seven young women and three young men sheltering in a secluded villa just outside Florence to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city. To make their exile more pleasant each of the ten tells the others one story every day. The Decameron records the narratives of ten days -- 100 stories. Boccaccio probably conceived of The Decameron after the epidemic of 1348, and completed it by 1353. These tales run the entire range of human emotion: grief, love, humor, anger, revenge. Many are based on oral folklore. Boccaccio's ten narrators thus retell already familiar stories about errant priests, rascally husbands, and mischievous wives. Variants of these stories are known in many cultures, but no one formulates them more cleverly or relates them more eloquently than does Boccaccio. In addition to its literary value and widespread influence, it provides a document of life at the time. Written in the vernacular of the Florentine language, it is considered a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose. -
The Most Pleasant and Delectable Questions of Love, by Giovanni Boccaccio, illus. by Alexander King (Three Sirens Press, [copyright, Illustrated Editions Company, New York] 1931) 6.5"x9.5", 133pp, gilt top-edge other edges deckled, tan and maroon boards, binding good, some soiling and edges bumped. "The translation of 1566 [the fourth part of Filocolo] by H. G. Put into modern English with an introduction by Thomas Bell." This book is 13 chapters of one of Boccaccio's longer works, "Il libro di Difinizioni", first translated into English by "H.G." (probably Henry Grantham) in London, 1566. In these chapters, a group of young people have gone to the country for the day. One of the young women is chosen "The Queen of Love." Each young person tells a love story and poses a question about love. The group answers; there is no right or wrong. But the final arbiter, "The Queen of Love," holds the answers. Giovanni Boccaccio (1313-1375) was an Italian author and poet, a friend, student, and correspondent of Petrarch, an important Renaissance humanist and the author of a number of notable works including the Decameron, On Famous Women, and his poetry in the Italian vernacular. Boccaccio is particularly notable for his dialogue, of which it has been said that it surpasses in verisimilitude that of virtually all of his contemporaries, since they were medieval writers and often followed formulaic models for character and plot. Alexander King (1899–1965), born Alexander Koenig in Vienna, was a bestselling humorist, memoirist and media personality of the early television era, based in the United States. In his late fifties, after becoming a frequent guest on the a Tonight Show hosted by Jack Paar, King emerged as an incongruous presence in the realm of national celebrity: an aging, irascible raconteur, with elegant mannerisms and trademark bow-tie, who spoke frankly and disarmingly about his bohemian lifestyle, multiple marriages, and years-long struggle with drug addiction. His checkered past led TIME magazine to describe him as "an ex-illustrator, ex-cartoonist, ex-adman, ex-editor, ex-playwright, ex-dope addict. For a quarter-century he was an ex-painter, and by his own bizarre account qualifies as an ex-midwife. He is also an ex-husband to three wives and an ex-Viennese of sufficient age (60) to remember muttonchopped Emperor Franz Joseph. When doctors told him a few years ago that he might soon be an ex-patient (two strokes, serious kidney disease, peptic ulcer, high blood pressure), he sat down to tell gay stories of the life of all these earlier Kings." -
Sextravaganza, by M. de Crebillon le Fils, With and Introduction by Escar Levine, Illustrator unknown (Privately Printed [The Robin Hood House], New York 1932, one of 1111) 6.25"x9.5", 192pp, decorated boards, vellum spine with silver lettering, some spots and bumps but generally a good copy of this edition. Originally titled La Nuit et le moment ou les matines de Cythère [The night and the moment, or the mornings of Cythere], this is Robin Hood House's famous US "private" publication from the 30's and for a long time the only english translation available in the states. Written as a dialog, in the course of one night a man and a woman, each of whom is in love with somebody else, gradually warm up to each other until they forget past pleasures in present passions . Satire, irony, word-play and scandal abound. This edition states "only eleven hundred eleven copies have been issued for collectors of curiosa & sexualia". Claude Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (1707-1777) was a French novelist. He was called "Crébillon fils" to distinguish him from his father, a famous tragedian, Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon. The publication of Tanzaï et Neadarne, histoire japonaise (1734), which contained thinly veiled attacks on the Papal bull Unigenitus, the cardinal de Rohan and others, landed him briefly in the prison at Vincennes. Publication of Le Sopha, conte moral, an erotic political satire, in 1742 forced him into exile from Paris for several months. -
Ex Biblioteca Erotica LS woman sitting on shoulder of a "cock" face -
Way out West with the fucking Tiger, A Bungstopper production, (n.p. n.d.) 4.5" x 3", 8pp. pamphlet, stapled Tijuana bibles (also known as eight-pagers, bluesies, gray-backs, Jiggs-and-Maggie books, jo-jo books, Tillie-and-Mac books, and two-by-fours) were little pornographic comic books produced in the United States from the 1920s to the early 1960s. -
The Frigidaire Salesman, (n.p. n.d.) 4.5" x 3", 8pp. pamphlet, stapled Tijuana bibles (also known as eight-pagers, bluesies, gray-backs, Jiggs-and-Maggie books, jo-jo books, Tillie-and-Mac books, and two-by-fours) were little pornographic comic books produced in the United States from the 1920s to the early 1960s. -
The Amatory Adventures of The Lustful Turk | or | Lascivious Scenes from a Harem | faithfully and vividly depicted in a series of letters from a young and beautiful English lady to her cousin in England, Anonymous ("Paris: Privately Printed, 1904" [this is a later facsimile printing, np nd]) The Lustful Turk, or Lascivious Scenes from a Harem is a pre-Victorian British erotic epistolary novel first published anonymously in 1828. (although this edition says it is "signed 10th of April, 1868) However, it was not widely known or circulated until the 1893 edition. The novel consists largely of a series of letters written by its heroine, Emily Barlow, to her friend, Sylvia Carey. When Emily sails from England for India in June 1814 her ship is attacked by Moorish pirates and she is taken to the harem of Ali, Dey of Algiers. The Dey rapes her and subjects her to his will, awakening her sexual passions. Emily's debasement continues when the Dey insists on anal sex, arousing the horror of her correspondent Sylvia, who expresses her indignation at the Dey's behaviour, in a letter that the latter intercepts. Annoyed at her attitude, the Dey arranges for Sylvia to be abducted and brought to the slave market of Algiers. After an elaborate charade in which the Dey pretends to be a sympathetic Frenchman, bidding to save her from sexual slavery, and engaging her in a fake marriage, he deflowers her and awakens her sexuality, as he had done with Emily. Revealing his true identity the Dey enjoys both girls together. This sexual idyll is eventually terminated when a new addition to harem objects to anal rape and cuts off the Dey's penis with a knife, and then commits suicide. Seemingly unfazed by this, the Dey has "his lost members preserved in spirits of wine in glass vases" which he presents to Emily and Sylvia, sending them back to England with these tokens of his affection. The novel also incorporates interpolated stories concerning the erotic misadventures of three other girls abducted into the harem and enlarges on the fate of Emily's maid Eliza who, presented by the Dey to Muzra, Bey of Tunis, is bound, flogged and raped in turn. -
Les infortunes de la vertu, Marquis de Sade, introduction by Jean Paulhan (les editions du point du jour, 1946, "incidences" collection, #908/2000) 5.75" x 7.75", xlii+242pp, softcover "french wraps", good unread condition, many pages remain uncut. This edition appears to represent the original version of Justine that Sade wrote while imprisoned at the Bastille in 1787 (see below). The story is about Justine from age 12 to 26 and recounts all of her attempts to be virtuous no matter what life throws at her. She is constantly presented with sexual lessons hidden under a virtuous mask. She seeks refuge in a monastery but is forced to become a sex slave of the monks. After she helps a gentleman who is robbed in a field, he takes her back to his chateau on the pretext to have her help care for his wife. He confines her in a cave where she is subjected to more punishment. When she goes to a judge to beg for mercy in her case as an arsonist, she then finds herself openly humiliated in court, unable to defend herself. The moral(especially when juxtaposed with the "companion story", Juliette) seems to be that one should not resist a bit of vice if it is for the common good. The more Justine tries to resist temptation and be virtuous the further she was plunged into a life of vice and torture, while Juliette (her sister) submitted to a brief period of debauchery and vice and eventually lived a comfortable, happy existence. The Marquis de Sade wrote the first version of Justine (Les infortunes de la vertu, "The Misfortunes of Virtue") while imprisoned at the Bastille in 1787. In 1791 an expanded and more explicit version became Sade's first published work. In 1797, an even more detailed version was published along with a story of Juliette (Justine's sister) that comprised of 10 volumes and nearly 4000 pages. This final version, "La Nouvelle Justine", departed from the first-person narrative of the previous two versions, and included around 100 engravings. Most editions are taken from that 1797 Holland edition. Napoleon Bonaparte ordered the arrest of the anonymous author of Justine and Juliette, and as a result Sade was incarcerated for the last 13 years of his life. Napoleon called the work "the most abominable book ever engendered by the most depraved imagination". English titles: Justine, or the Misfortune(s) of Virtue; The Misfortunes of Virtue; Justine, or Good Conduct Well Chastised; Justine or Good Conduct Will Be Chastised -
2.5" x 3" Old Shackle with ring Antique hand-forged iron shackles from a farm in Bulgaria. They have been cleaned up and seasoned much like you'd season your cast iron skillet (repeatedly coated with oil and baked). No key is needed as they lock using a puzzle design. -
The Heptameron, of Margaret, Queen of Navarre, Margaret of Navarre, Léopold Flameng illus. (Printed by Private Subscription and for private circulation only, np. nd. London, #61/500) 6.25″ X 7.5″, xxix-384pp, three-quarter bound over marbled boards, gilt title & decorations including boarder of leather, 8 etchings by Flameng The Heptameron is a collection of 72 short stories written in French by Marguerite of Navarre (1492-1549), published posthumously in 1558. It has the form of a frame narrative and was inspired by The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio. It was originally intended to contain one hundred stories covering ten days just as The Decameron does, but at Marguerite’s death it was only completed as far as the second story of the eighth day. Many of the stories deal with love, lust, infidelity, and other romantic and sexual matters. I do not know publisher or date to this edition, although it is very similar to the 1881 G. Barrie edition (page numbers and the Flemeng plates, and the Edition De Luxe label). Either it is a later pirate of that edition or an alternate printing from that batch. -
A Complete Encyclopaedia of the Sexual Sciences, Dr. Iwan Bloch, trans Dr. M. Eden Paul (Falstaff Press, New York, 1937) 8.75" X 5.75", xxx+790pp, hardbound, no DJ, decorative red cloth with gilt lettering and decorations. The 30 pages of the preface printed in black with red decorations (mostly praise of the book and the author by various people including Dr. Bloch). Good condition, corners bumped, some fading/spotting on cover and spine, binding very good. "The author's aim in writing this book was to write a complete Encyclopaedia on the sexual sciences, and it will probably be acknowledged by all who study its pages that the author has accomplished his intention in a very scholarly manner, and in such form as to be of great value to the professions for whom this translation is intended. The subject is no doubt one which appeals to and affects the interests of all adult persons, but the publishers have, after very serious and careful consideration, come to the conclusion that the sale of the English translation of the book shall be limited to members of the legal and medical professions." -from Publisher's Note -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.5" X 4.25", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
anonymous (Paris, France, nd.) 5.25" X 4", 32pp, softcover, good quality for age, illustrated with pornographic photos -
Life Lines, Arthur S. Gray ("Published in Cleveland, Ohio by the author and friends, Privately by Subscription, 1936") 10 1/8 X 6 3/4, 93pp, hardbound no DJ, deckle edges, good condition, slight soiling to boards The title page reads "Life Lines, a divertisement by and for Arthur S. Gray". Published in Cleveland, Ohio by the author and friends, Privately by Subscription, 1936". The author writes in his preface, "Because this book is a Michelangelo collection of poems and drawings done now and then for my diversion and satisfaction, it is necessary to announce that the pictures are not illustrations. Each drawing is a simple record of some particular and more or less unique quality which caught my attention and incited me to draw. After the prime reason, the urge to make something. I draw the way I do for two reasons: first to preserve the integrity of my powers of observation and reaction; second, to render that respect which is the natural right of an individual entity." -
Aphrodite (Ancient Manners), Pierre Louys, trans. Willis L. Parker, illustrator Frank J. Buttera (Three Sirens Press, New York, 1932) 9 1/2" X 6 1/4", 251pp, hardbound no DJ, red cloth over boards with gilt decorations, deckle fore and bottom edge, inked top edge, very good condition, minor bumping to corners Pierre Louys (1870 - 1925) was a French poet and writer, most renowned for lesbian and classical themes in some of his writings. He is known as a writer who "expressed pagan sensuality with stylistic perfection." "Aphrodite: mæurs antiques" (Ancient Manners) is a "libertine" story set in ancient Alexandria. Highlights include the loves of Chrysis, an orgy banquet ending in the crucifixion of a slave, the love of two young musician girls and the festivals of Aphrodite. This edition is illustrated by Frank J. Buttera
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