(urth) The mystery of the image of an astronaut cleaned by Rudesind

[brunians at brunians.org]

Dodgson is known to have had relationships with younger, albeit adult,
women whom he had known since childhood.

This would have been scandalous, but was not considered beyond the pale in
enlightened circles.

It was kept quiet by the people who knew about it.

.


> Lee Berman <severiansola at hotmail.com> writes:
>
>> Lewis Carroll was a lifelong bachelor who enjoyed taking nude pictures
>> of pre-pubescent girls. If you think Gene Wolfe is alluding to him with
>> Inire and his looking glass/mirrors and finds both a bit creepy I would
>> not disagree.  Still I must guess Wolfe admires Lewis Carroll as he does
>> other referenced authors such as J.L. Borges, Rudyard Kipling and Mary
>> Shelley.
>
> It's probably also worth mentioning that several modern historians believe
> this was nowhere near as shocking as it sounds to modern sensibilities.
> At the time, photography was very new and photography advocates and
> hobbyists were trying to treat it as an art form akin to painting, with
> very similar goals.  The classical nude, of a variety of ages, was common
> subject material for painting, and hence it's likely that photography
> enthusiasts considered it suitable subject material for photography as
> well, for a variety of artistic reasons that don't necessarily have
> anything directly to do with sex or eroticism.  There's also some evidence
> that child nudes were seen as a symbol of innocence and were simply not
> viewed with the approbation that they are today, to the extent that they
> may have appeared on Christmas cards and the like.
>
> For much more on this topic, see the work of Hugues Lebailly, who among
> others has been calling into question the traditional interpretation of
> Carroll's photographic subjects (which are far more varied than just young
> girls as is often believed).
>
> On a similar front, there's also some reason to believe that Carroll's
> supposed preference for young girls over other companions is way overblown
> and is based largely on a few written comments taken out of context.  See,
> for example, <http://carrollmyth.com/contrariwise/cldandfemales.html>.
>
> --
> Russ Allbery (rra at stanford.edu)             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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