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October 17, 2008
The immense symbolic value of
nudity in the United States in
the early 20th century is NUDE
probably a little hard to grasp,
even today, when you can hardly
say it's lost it's power.
For example, one of the main
risque features of Thorne Smith THORNE
comedies was that the reader
was told that some characters
are running around naked.
This is not *described* you
understand, just stated-- the
bare fact of bareness is what's
important.
In the novels "A Princess of SKYLARK
Mars" (1912) and "The Skylark
of Space" (1928) there are AMAZING_AUGUST_1928
alien planets where the natives
go nearly naked except for
jeweled decorations.
The point is not belabored in the
texts, but I gather the contemporary
reader was supposed to be enthralled by
the mental image of beautiful naked women
done up in strands of jewels.
EMERALD_LAND
This is one of the
advantages of print:
you can be told they're
all naked but without
any description it No similar dodge
stays this side of the exists for stage,
pornography line. or screen... or TIGHTS
comics.
Except for "tights"
The superhero
(Or the savage is symbolically
loin-cloth, naked.
the Savage
ripped shirt). In one of my
old Marvel
comics, a
coloring
mistake had
the hero in
flesh tones:
the clear
image of a
naked man was
suddenly very
embarrassing.
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