From Sexual Liberation to Gender Trouble: Reading Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure from the 1960s to the 1990s

Abstract

If 1963, as Philip Larkin claims, was a good year for sexual intercourse, it was an annus mirabilis for John Cleland's first novel, Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure. Since its initial publication in two installments in November 1748 and February 1749, the Memoirs had been a best seller but an illicit one. 2 Although entirely free from vulgar terminology, it contains more explicit descriptions of a broad range of sexual practices than any previous work in English. Government action against the novel began in November 1749, when a warrant was issued for the arrest of the author, the printer, and the publishers. Cleland and his associates were found guilty in court, and the novel was withdrawn, at least officially, from circulation. Despite losing the case, however, Cleland seems to have escaped lightly; no record of any punishment exists. Shortly after his release, Cleland produced a heavily bowdlerized version of the Memoirs, entitled Memoirs of Fanny Hill, 3 published in March 1750. 4 Readers, not surprisingly, eschewed this anodyne, ostensibly didactic abridgement in favor of the banned original, which circulated widely in underground form for over two hundred years, [End Page 561] albeit with the omission of one crucial passage that I shall turn to shortly. Issued by small presses, Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure appeared primarily in deluxe, illustrated editions, designed as collectors' items, and as such offering little provocation. 5 Reputable publishers stayed away; the novel was sold and read surreptitiously. 6