City of Sin: London and its Vices
(Paperback)
Publishing Details
City of Sin: London and its Vices
By (Author) Catharine Arnold
Simon & Schuster Ltd
Simon & Schuster Ltd
9th June 2011
United Kingdom
Classifications
General
Non Fiction
942.1
Physical Properties
Paperback
384
Width 129mm, Height 198mm
Description
If Paris is the city of love, then London is the city of lust. For over a thousand years, England's capital has been associated with desire, avarice and the sins of the flesh. Richard of Devises, a monk writing in 1180, warned that 'every quarter [of the city] abounds in great obscenities'. As early as the second century AD, London was notorious for its raucous festivities and disorderly houses, and throughout the centuries the bawdy side of life has taken easy root and flourished.
In the third book of her fascinating London trilogy, award-winning popular historian Catharine Arnold turns her gaze to the city's relationship with vice through the ages. From the bath houses and brothels of Roman Londinium, to the stews and Molly houses of the 17thand 18thcenturies, London has always traded in the currency of sex. Whether pornographic publishers on Fleet Street, or fancy courtesans parading in Haymarket, its streets have long been witness to colourful sexual behaviour.
In her usual accessible and entertaining style, Arnold takes us on a journey through the fleshpots of London from earliest times to present day. Here are buxom strumpets, louche aristocrats, popinjay politicians and Victorian flagellants -- all vying for their place in London's league of licentiousness. From sexual exuberance to moral panic, the city has seen the pendulum swing from Puritanism to hedonism and back again. With later chapters looking at Victorian London and the sexual underground of the 20thcentury and beyond, this is a fascinating and vibrant chronicle of London at its most raw and ribald.
Author Bio
Catharine Arnold read English at Cambridge and holds a further degree in psychology. A journalist, academic and popular historian, her previous books include the novel Lost Time, winner of a Betty Trask award, and the acclaimed Necropolis: London and Its Dead, Bedlam and City ofSin, the first three volumes of her 'London' series. She lives in Nottingham.
