United States: "(a) the dominant theme of the material taken as a whole appeals to a prurient interest in sex (b) the material is patently offensive because it affronts contemporary community standards relating to the description or representation of sexual matters, and (c) the material is utterly without redeeming social value." Additional topics In his opinion, Brennan set out the three point test the Court had defined in its earlier decision in Roth v. In those cases, Justices Brennan, Warren, and Fortas agreed with the dissenters in the Fanny Hill case that the materials in question were obscene. Both of those cases involved criminal charges, and in both cases the Supreme Court upheld convictions for violation of obscenity laws. The case was decided along with two other obscenity cases, Ginzburg v. However, Justice Clark said in his opinion that the book was solely about sex, noting the explicitness of the sexual activities portrayed in it. Douglas noted that the book had survived for over 200 years despite many efforts to ban it, and that libraries and universities sought to purchase copies when it was published. Graham observed, in a speech appended to Douglas's opinion, that the book was feared more because it raised serious questions about what is, and is not, moral, rather than because of its sexual scenes.
#FANNY HILL TRIAL#
He noted that expert witnesses at the trial introduced "considerable and impressive testimony to the effect that this was a work of literary, historical, and social importance." Rev. an erotic novel." As described by Douglas, the book is the story of a young girl who becomes a prostitute in London, but eventually abandons that life to marry her first lover. Justice Douglas noted in his opinion that Fanny Hill was "concededly. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court affirmed the trial court's ruling. The trial judge found the book obscene and therefore not entitled to the protection of the First and Fourteenth Amendments. A hearing was held before a trial judge, who reviewed the book and took evidence from experts to assess its literary, cultural, and educational character. Putnam's Sons, who had published the book, intervened in the suit. In the 1960s, the attorney general of Massachusetts filed a suit against the book itself to declare it obscene, an unusual proceeding permitted under Massachusetts law. The book was adapted to the little or big screen several times.John Cleland wrote Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure in about 1750. An American edition of the book was also forbidden in 1821 because of its "obscenity". It was censored when published and Cleland was arrested. The book is often considered to be the first pornographic novel ever written. The plot describes the sexual adventures of a young woman from a village near Liverpool (UK) who becomes a prostitute when she is recruited by one Mrs. After their trips, she settled again in Horselberg.įanny Hill is the main character of Fanny Hill, or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, an epistolary novel written by British author John Cleland in 1749. Due to the mystical properties of Horselberg, Fanny aged very slowly, and was still young when she encountered Clegg and Gulliver again, decades later, now as members of the second incarnation of the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. She joined the League and, after its dissolution following Gulliver's death, she start traveling again through erotic Europe with fellow League members, Percy and Marguerite Blakeney and the sex-changing Orlando.
Fanny Hill is a former British prostitute and a member of Gulliver's Fellowship.Īfter living a beautiful love-story which ultimately led to her husband cheating on her, Fanny started traveling through the sexual landcapes of Europe, eventually coming across Lemuel Gulliver and Captain Clegg, before settling in the land of Horselberg, where she became lover of Queen Venus.
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