Victorian pleasures

British Broadcasting Corporation Home. Sex, drugs and hedonism, a summer weekend for today's twenty-somethings or the average Victorian weekend? Matthew Sweet investigates. You've seen it in a hundred costume dramas. A group of Victorians sitting around the piano. Men in dinner suits, women twitching fans, the daughter of the household bashing out a Mendelsohn standard, polite applause muffled by white kid gloves, and another round of constipated dialogue.

The popular image of the Victorians is one of buttoned up social manners and table legs covered in cloths in case the menfolk became overexcited. But there was far more lurking under the surface of Victorian society than the history books would have you think. Syphilis was seemingly everywhere in the mid s — not only was it disfiguring, it could affect your mental health and also be passed down to your children and there was no cure. The Goodyear factory began producing rubber condoms in , but most were still made from animal intestine, which was prone to tearing.

For many, the seaside pier is perhaps the most iconic symbol of the British seaside holiday and the epitome of excursions to the coast. Piers have always provided holidaymakers with entertainment, from the grand pavilions and theatres of the Victorian era, to the amusement arcades of the s. For two centuries, piers have been the place to see and be seen at the seaside. Victorian pleasure piers are unique to the UK, but they are under threat: in the early 20th century nearly piers graced the UK coastline, but almost half of of these have now gone. By their very nature, seaside piers are risky structures.

Museum no. According to their own testimonies, many people born in the Victorian age were both factually uninformed and emotionally frigid about sexual matters. Historically, it appeared that the licentious behaviour and attitudes of the Regency period had been replaced by a new order of puritan control and repression - personified by the censorious figure of Mrs Grundy - which was imposed by the newly dominant bourgeoisie, steadily permeated all classes, and lasted well into the 20th century. Then a hypocritical 'shadow side' to this public denial was glimpsed, in the 'secret world' of Victorian prostitution and pornography, and more openly in the 'naughty nineties'.