Walter Kendrick traces the relatively recent concept of pornography—the word was not coined until the late 18th century—which became a public issue once the printing press gave ordinary people access to the erotica of the Greeks and Romans, the art and literature of the French enlightenment, and the poems of the Earl of Rochester and John Cleland's Fanny Hill. From the secret museums to the pornography trials of Madame Bovary and Lady Chatterly's Lover, to Mapplethorpe, cable TV, and the Internet, Kendrick explores how conceptions of pornography relate to issues of freedom of expression and censorship.

Walter Kendrick is Professor of English at Fordham University and author of The Thrill of Fear: 250 Years of Scary Entertainment (1991) among other titles.

"Highly illuminating. . . . Mr. Kendrick writes crisply and amusingly about both the emergence of the word 'pornography' and its subsequent history."—John Gross, New York Times

"An engaging, readable, and deeply perceptive analysis that details the evolution of the idea of pornography and its attendant and ever-changing sensibilities over the last two centuries. [It] patiently attempts to supply a cultural context for not only pornography but also the role that sexuality and imagination themselves play in our lives."—Michael Bronski, Boston Phoenix