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开 本: 16开纸 张: 胶版纸包 装: 精装是否套装: 否国际标准书号ISBN: 9780807051122
“…Miller’s book is rich with colorful anecdotes.”—Journal of
American History
“This is a superb example of breathtaking research, presented in a
style that will appeal to a broad audience…Rather than delivering a
detailed history of the Watch and Ward, he offers up a series of
vignettes that are historically accurate yet thoroughly
entertaining in their telling. This is social history at its
finest, and Miller should be applauded for resurrecting the history
of this influential group that had a national
reputation.”—Choice Reviews
“The fight for artistic freedom in America begins in Boston, and
Miller gives us a front-row seat.”–Christopher M. Finan, president
of the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression and
author of From the Palmer Raids to the Patriot Act
“Miller relates a wealth of historical anecdotes…[they] left no
shortage of entertaining censorship initiatives for Miller to
recall here for readers’ enjoyment.”–Booklist
“As a catchphrase, ‘banned in Boston’ made history; as an
imprimatur it sold books.” —Chronicle Review
“With precision, perception, and wry wit, Neil Miller serves up
a juicy tale of censorship past. From sex, drugs, and a swearing
parrot to almost anything French, Banned in Boston
demonstrates that campaigns to save us from ourselves never go out
of fashion.”—Nan Levinson, author of Outspoken: Free Speech
Stories
“A lively history of the notorious Watch and Ward Society, which
for a century sought to establish decency by suppressing ‘obscene’
works by authors such as Boccaccio, Whitman, Dreiser, Faulkner, and
Mencken. This is a must read for anyone interested in understanding
how censorship ultimately destroys not indecency, but
freedom.”—Geoffrey R. Stone, author of Perilous Times: Free
Speech in Wartime from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on
Terrorism
“I read this book with one eye over my shoulder, fully expecting
the Watch and Ward police to burst in and confiscate it for being
too provocative! But it would have been worth it. Neil Miller has
given us everything we could ask for in an enjoyable history—a
revealing subject, well-drawn characters, and a colorful portrait
of another era, all wrapped in a fast-paced, easy-to-read story.
Banned in Boston is a Boston gem.”—Stephen Puleo, author of
A City So Grand, The Boston Italians, and Dark
Tide
“Neil Miller has created a fascinating and often funny history of a
time when censors ruled. The fight for artistic freedom in America
begins in Boston, and Miller gives us a front-row
seat.”—Christopher M. Finan, president of the American Booksellers
Foundation for Free Expression and author of From the Palmer
Raids to the Patriot Act: A History of the Fight for Free Speech in
America
“As a catchphrase, “banned in Boston” made history; as an
imprimatur it sold books. Now telling its story in rollicking
fashion is Banned in Boston: The Watch and Ward Society’s Crusade
Against Books, Burlesque, and the Social Evil (Beacon Press), by
Neil Miller…”- Chronicle Review
“…Miller relates a wealth of historical anecdotes regarding the
likes of H. L. Mencken, Upton Sinclair, and Walt Whitman …the
society moved on to other matters of perceived public good, but it
left no shortage of entertaining censorship initiatives for Miller
to recall here for readers’ enjoyment.”-Booklist
“Miller, who knew almost nothing about the history of book
banning in Boston before beginning research for his book, was
presented with the idea for this latest project by his publishers
at Beacon Press after they discovered that their office was located
in the old New England Watch and Ward Society headquarters.
Ironically enough, the building is now a hub of dissemination of
many of the types of literature that the society once sought to
ban, he said.”-The Tufts Daily
“A fast-paced, highly readable account of a forgotten…chapter in
Boston’s history.”
–PhiloBiblos
“Mr. Miller has provided a service by being the first to
document the entire history of the notorious Watch and Ward
Society, from its formation in 1878 to its last, dying gasps in the
1950s. The story is fascinating and often funny, and the author
(who teaches journalism at Tufts University) tells it with clarity
and perception.”- The Washington Times
“Banned in Boston is Neil Miller’s entertaining and
informative account of the Society’s activities from its founding
through its heyday in the early 1960s…Banned in Boston
provides a balanced look at a local movement that represented a
widespread – and continuing – tension within American society.”-
Suite 101
anonymous Bostonian, 1929
In this spectacular romp through the Puritan City, Neil Miller
relates the scintillating story of how a powerful band of Brahmin
moral crusaders helped make Boston the most straitlaced city in
America, forever linked with the infamous catchphrase “Banned in
Boston.”
Bankrolled by society’s upper crust, the New England Watch and Ward
Society acted as a quasi-vigilante police force and notorious
literary censor for over eighty years. Often going over the heads
of local authorities, it orchestrated the mass censorship of books
and plays, raided gambling dens and brothels, and utilized spies to
entrap prostitutes and their patrons.
Miller deftly traces the growth of the Watch and Ward, from its
formation in 1878 to its waning days in the 1950s. During its
heyday, the society and its imitators banished modern classics by
Hemingway, Faulkner, and Sinclair Lewis and went to war with
publishing and literary giants such as Alfred A. Knopf and The
Atlantic Monthly. To the chagrin of the Watch and Ward, some
writers rode the national wave of publicity that accompanied the
banning of their books. Upton Sinclair declared staunchly, “I would
rather be banned in Boston than read anywhere else because when you
are banned in Boston, you are read everywhere else.” Others faced
extinction or tried to barter their way onto bookshelves, like Walt
Whitman, who hesitantly removed lines from Leaves of Grass under
the watchful eye of the Watch and Ward. As the Great Depression
unfolded, the society shifted its focus from bookstores to
burlesque, successfully shuttering the Old Howard, the city’s
legendary theater that attracted patrons from T. S. Eliot to John
F. Kennedy.
Banned in Boston is a lively history and, despite Boston’s
“liberal” reputation today, a cautionary tale of the dangers caused
by moral crusaders of all stripes.
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