Cover of 1959 lesbian pulp fiction novel The Third Sex by Artemis Smith
Lesbian pulp fiction is a genre of lesbian literature that refers to any mid-20th century paperback novel or pulp magazine with overtly lesbian themes and content. Lesbian pulp fiction was published in the 1950s and 1960s by many of the same paperback publishing houses as other genres of fiction, including westerns, romances, and detective fiction.[clarification needed] Because very little other literature was available for and about lesbians at this time, quite often these books were the only reference the public (lesbian and otherwise) had for modeling what lesbians were. English professor Stephanie Foote commented on the importance of lesbian pulp novels to the lesbian identity prior to the rise of organized feminism: "Pulps have been understood as signs of a secret history of readers, and they have been valued because they have been read. The more they are read, the more they are valued, and the more they are read, the closer the relationship between the very act of circulation and reading and the construction of a lesbian community becomes…. Characters use the reading of novels as a way to understand that they are not alone."[1] Joan Nestle refers to lesbian pulp fiction as “survival literature.”[2] Lesbian pulp fiction provided representation for lesbian identities, brought a surge of awareness to lesbians, and created space for lesbian organizing leading up to Stonewall.[2]
These books were sold at drugstores, magazine stands, bus terminals and other places where one might look to purchase cheap, consumable entertainment. The books were small enough to fit in a purse or back pocket (hence both the brand-name and the generalized term "pocket books") and cheap enough to throw away when the reader was through with them.
^Foote, Stephanie (2005). "Deviant Classics: Pulps and the Making of Lesbian Print Culture". Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. 31 (1): 169–190. doi:10.1086/432742. ISSN 0097-9740. S2CID 146709054.
^ abReis, Elizabeth (2012). American Sexual Histories (2nd ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley-Blackwell. pp. 271–279, 288–290. ISBN 978-1-4443-3929-1.
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