Father Inire's photo album

William H. Ansley · 09 Sep 1998, 00:01 · from urth-v0018.mbox · original

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From: "William H. Ansley" <wansley at warwick.net>
Subject: Re: (urth) Father Inire's photo album
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 1998 00:01:53
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Dan Parmenter <dan at lec.com> wrote:

>From: "William H. Ansley" <wansley at warwick.net>
>
>Mantis>> Happily, Inire seems to be just enamoured by little
>exultantesses, and there
>Mantis>> is no evidence of his actually molesting them. Boy, wouldn't that
>be an
>Mantis>> embarassment to the reign of the Autarch Severian.
>
>>I certainly hope no one reading this list thinks that Charles Lutwidge
>>Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) molested any children. He didn't. He also wasn't a
>>child pornographer - mantis was joking (I hope).
>
>I guess it depends on how you define "pornography".  Dodgson
>definitely took pictures of naked little girls.  This is not a
>controversial assertion as far as I know, and this is what Mantis was
>talking about.
>

Yup, I guess it does. I didn't write "Lewis Carroll wasn't a child
pornographer despite the fact that he took pictures of naked little girls,"
not because I wasn't aware of that he took pictures of naked little girls
(as well as clothed ones) but because I assumed that the people who read
this list would know this fact.

Despite the fact that this hobby probably indicates a major kink in Charles
Lutwidge Dodgson's personality and sexuality (he never married nor had any
kind of sexual relationship, as far as anyone knows), the fact remains that
the Victorian fashion at the time to idealize small children as completely
pure and innocent beings made it easy to present his photographs as Art.
Dodgson never put his nude photographs on public display, was very
selective in who he let view them, never published them and requested that
all the nude photographs be destroyed after his death, which they were.

Dodgson always asked permission of parents before he photographed their
daughters in the nude (although he might play word games if the parents
didn't directly tell him not to) and he never photographed a little girl in
the nude who was at all unwilling that he do so.

I think the above statements disqualify Dodgson as a child pornographer.
While I certainly don't find this aspect of Dodgson's artistic endeavors to
be particularly appealing, I object to seeing him branded as something he
was not.

If my arguments seem unconvincing, well, everyone is entitled to their own
opinion. This discussion thread is by now completely off topic and I have
no intention of contributing any more messages to it.

William Ansley

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