What does Ballykissangel have in common with the dirtiest book of the Victorian era? This coincidence I stumbled upon while researching the counterculture of London’s swinging ’60s – that is, the 1860s. What happens offstage, behind the action, in the Victorian novels we know so well? I sought specifics: where did Dorian Gray go that […]
Clean Minds, Dirty Books
What’s the dirtiest book you’ve ever read? Writers’ research can lead to awkward places. “Oh yes?” says my wife, glimpsing a passage of Walter’s My Secret Life on my screen. “You’re ‘researching’ again, are you?” Private Case, Public Scandal by Peter Fryer was the peculiar tome that pointed me to the explosion in the Victorian […]