Modern Whore

Oh, the places a whore will go: Strip clubs, four-star hotels, stinking basement apartments, luxury cottages. A striking memoir by Andrea Werhun and Nicole Bazuin documents Andrea's sex work career in lush photography and powerful words—in all its slippery, sexy, silly and sometimes heartbreaking glory. Andrea Werhun's sex work career gave her money, freedom, joy, and a lot of dick. A natural performer, she revelled in the opportunity to invent Mary Ann, her escort counterpart, and introduce her to men all over the city. She whores, she learns, she writes it all down, and then, as per a signed document she handed to her Catholic mother in her early twenties, she quits. To become a stripper. Andrea and Nicole revisit the idea of the modern whore, with the enhanced perspective of Andrea's experience at the strip club. This new, engorged edition of the sold-out memoir-cum-art book expands on the original concept--a series of vignettes exploring the many identities sex workers adopt in the service of their clients and in the eyes of the public--in both a literal and literary way. But Andrea doesn't shy away from the serious side of sex work, either, exploring the risks sex workers take, and the rights our culture is constantly taking away from them. This series of stories and portraits investigate the many ways we imagine—and mistake—the modern whore. It's Playboy if the Playmates were in charge.

Oh, the places a whore will go: Strip clubs, four-star hotels, stinking basement apartments, luxury cottages. A striking memoir by Andrea Werhun and Nicole Bazuin documents Andrea's sex work career in lush photography and powerful words—in all its slippery, sexy, silly and sometimes heartbreaking glory. Andrea Werhun's sex work career gave her money, freedom, joy, and a lot of dick. A natural performer, she revelled in the opportunity to invent Mary Ann, her escort counterpart, and introduce her to men all over the city. She whores, she learns, she writes it all down, and then, as per a signed document she handed to her Catholic mother in her early twenties, she quits. To become a stripper. Andrea and Nicole revisit the idea of the modern whore, with the enhanced perspective of Andrea's experience at the strip club. This new, engorged edition of the sold-out memoir-cum-art book expands on the original concept--a series of vignettes exploring the many identities sex workers adopt in the service of their clients and in the eyes of the public--in both a literal and literary way. But Andrea doesn't shy away from the serious side of sex work, either, exploring the risks sex workers take, and the rights our culture is constantly taking away from them. This series of stories and portraits investigate the many ways we imagine—and mistake—the modern whore. It's Playboy if the Playmates were in charge.

Why would someone ever voluntarily become a sex worker? Liara Roux writes about the salacious details leading up to her decision to become a career sex worker, and the unexpected truths she learned while working in the industry. Liara Roux is accustomed to being mislabelled and misunderstood. As a child, Liara’s inquisitive, instinctive, and rebellious nature was frequently problematised in a world designed around the requirements of their neurotypical, cis, heterosexual male colleagues. Coming of age in an oppressively restrictive home, they shuffled tarot and explored self portraiture to rationalise the injustice of chronic pain, toxic lovers, and the cruel silence of divinity. Critiquing capitalism’s mechanisms of exploitation, the conservatism of Western medicine, and the politics surrounding sex work, Whore of New York: Confessions of a Sinful Woman is a candid study of artistic awakening, and both spiritual and sexual growth after abuse, seen through the eyes of a proud outsider.

In Virgin Whore, Emma Maggie Solberg uncovers a surprisingly prevalent theme in late English medieval literature and culture: the celebration of the Virgin Mary’s sexuality. Although history is narrated as a progressive loss of innocence, the Madonna has grown purer with each passing century. Looking to a period before the idea of her purity and virginity had ossified, Solberg uncovers depictions and interpretations of Mary, discernible in jokes and insults, icons and rituals, prayers and revelations, allegories and typologies—and in late medieval vernacular biblical drama. More unmistakable than any cultural artifact from late medieval England, these biblical plays do not exclusively interpret Mary and her virginity as fragile. In a collection of plays known as the N-Town manuscript, Mary is represented not only as virgin and mother but as virgin and promiscuous adulteress, dallying with the Trinity, the archangel Gabriel, and mortals in kaleidoscopic erotic combinations. Mary’s "virginity" signifies invulnerability rather than fragility, redemption rather than renunciation, and merciful license rather than ascetic discipline. Taking the ancient slander that Mary conceived Jesus in sin as cause for joyful laughter, the N-Town plays make a virtue of those accusations: through bawdy yet divine comedy, she redeems and exalts the crime. By revealing the presence of this promiscuous Virgin in early English drama and late medieval literature and culture—in dirty jokes told by Boccaccio and Chaucer, Malory’s Arthurian romances, and the double entendres of the allegorical Mystic Hunt of the Unicorn—Solberg provides a new understanding of Marian traditions.

Whores and Other Feminists fleshes out feminist politics from the perspective of sex workers--strippers, prostitutes, porn writers, producers and performers, dominatrices--and their allies. Comprising a range of voices from both within and outside the academy, this collection draws from traditional feminisms, postmodern feminism, queer theory, and sex radicalism. It stretches the boundaries of contemporary feminism, holding accountable both traditional feminism for stigmatizing sex workers, and also the sex industry for its sexist practices.

Amsterdam's reputation as a city of prostitutes is age-old. 'The Burgher and the Whore' is the story of the red light district's 'golden age', bringing to life the relationships between men and women and providing a fascinating account of what it was like to inhabit the greatest city of its day.

Like Shakespeare's Juliet, Annabella, accompanied by her down-to-earth nurse, is introduced to a series of suitors to her hand. Like Juliet, she finds all of them unsatisfactory - and rightly so, for the audience know that the nastiest of them is having an affair with her domineering aunt. Like Juliet, Annabella is wooed by a sensitive and passionate young man whose love she returns - but this young man happens to be her own brother, Giovanni. When they consummate their love and she, to avoid the scandal of extramarital pregnancy, agrees to marry her aunt's lover, the tragic outcome is inevitable. John Ford, writing his psychologically powerful and intellectually challenging tragedies in the early years of King Charles I's reign, is a playwright of the first rank, as 20th-century directors have shown both in the theatre and on film.

A Working History of Working Girls (and Guys) Have you ever wondered how Heidi Fleiss came to be the face of upscale prostitution or if Casanova really was the world's greatest lover? How about why Latin playboy Rubi Rubirosa got the nickname "The Ding Dong Daddy"? Anything but judgmental, Whore Stories sheds light on one of our more stigmatized icons: The Prostitute. Featuring the true stories of famous streetwalkers, call girls, rent boys, and go-go dancers, this book offers a revealing look at the men and women who have blazed the bawdy trail of prostitution since the dawn of time. While you may think that you know everything about this occupation, Whore Stories includes plenty of details and even celebrities, such as Maya Angelou and Bob Dylan, that will leave you in awe. From private schools and child preachers to mime fantasies and unfortunate amputations, this book uncovers the truth behind the world's oldest profession.