Bums, Aliens and Victorian Porn: The UL’s Secrets

The University Library: by sight, a massive red-brick phallus, and in my mind the place where books come to laugh and play.

Its special place in my affections partly stems from the fact that as a lawyer I never, ever have to work there. I’m also in awe of those three spine-tingling words: ‘Legal. Deposit. Library.’ Apparently the UL can get hold of any new title published in the UK free of charge (cheap bastards).

With over 8 million books floating around, and 800,000 new ones published every year, I figured they must have some really weird shit in there. I decided to investigate.

I ducked through a side door and somewhere on North Front I picked up this beauty:

The world somehow seemed a better place knowing someone had written a book on Ukrainian minstrels. Good for you, Natalie! And what a lovely yellow cover. I turned around to go back the way I came, but there was a glitch in the Matrix, and there was in fact a wall behind me, not a door.

So within five minutes I was lost and getting excited about yellow. So far, so very Wizard of Oz. I decided to look for something a bit more X-rated.

The Naughty

Honestly, given how many books they have, I was hoping for a bit more porn.

A furtive fumble with the library catalogue quickly revealed The Encyclopaedia of Unusual Sex Practices, 101 things not to say during sex, and Sex: an Oral History but they were all rather vanilla.

Then there was the wonderfully named Big Cunt and the totally terrifying Hate’s Clitoris and other poems. Can you imagine what Hate’s clitoris must look like? Big and red and angry, I’m guessing. Possibly with teeth. But you have to request them – I’m brave, but not that brave.

As I ventured to higher, darker floors I came across this charming green tome. It may look innocent, but it was filthy.

The title page ‘The Other Victorians’ might seem to suggest an alternate past universe, or perhaps a novel historical study, but nothing to hide under your mattress. The text, however, is priceless.

A personal fave was: ‘[H]ow they love you, and die as your hot spunk spurts, and their cunt liquidizes’.

Slutty

It was supposedly an academic treatment of Victorian porn, but I reckon, much like the author of Porn Studies, this was all a bit of an excuse.

The unlikely

In amongst the pussies and the tuches was Best Selling Jewish Porn Films. I’m Jewish, and I have no idea what Jewish porn involves. I climbed higher up the South Front in search of the weird.

The unlikely Would You Baptise an Alien?, was bested only by UFOs Here And Now. Translated from the Swedish (obviously), one select passage referred to an astrophysicst cataloguing sightings by ‘degrees of strangeness’. Totally scientific then. There are some token pictures of what are definitely Frisbees in the centre fold included for your ultimate viewing pleasure.

Perusing the shelves it was becoming clear quite how much there is to know. The Varsican Fold Belt Of The British Isles, When Care Givers Kill and a volume simply titled Blokes are all out there, should you ever need to know about why Varsican won’t fold his belt, those who give a shit then murder, or, I suppose, you just want to understand men.

I knew one thing for sure, though: what  I wanted to know about now was bums. I bee-lined for the medical section.

The downright disgusting

It’s a book about bums. A really big one. The photos were totally, totally grim. See:

And there wasn’t just one. There’s also a Treatise on the Fistula of the Anus, published in 1738 no less. Just near the bums (where it belongs, I suppose)  was a cheery blue volume on vaginal surgery:

I didn’t actually dare open that one, so if you really want to know what’s inside, or indeed know pretty much anything there is to be known, why not head to the big red dick in the sky. It’s a bit like the yellow brick road, if it were paved with books.