Showing results by narrator "Adam Zmith" in All Categories

In a crawlspace at the offices of Switchboard, a queer helpline in operation since 1974, lie dozens of log books kept by volunteers describing the phone calls they had taken: a teenager kicked out of home for dressing as the wrong gender; a lesbian terrified of having her baby taken away from her; a man arrested for chatting up another man; a young person wanting to know how to come out. These logs documented traces of tens of thousands of queer lives, captured by people who lent an ear to those in need.

How did early sexologists convince us that loving feet is deviant? Why did feet show up in poetry written during a medieval outbreak of gonorrhoea? And what did Victorian lesbians make of all this? These are the questions thrusting Solemates into a history of toe-botherers who will guide you through sex archives, online forums and a millennium of art, all with his trademark queer lens. Solemates brings to light the history of this peculiarly popular kink.

This is the intriguing story of how poppers wafted out of the lab and into gay bars, corner shops, bedrooms, and porn super cuts. Blending historical research with wry observation, Adam Zmith explores the cultural forces and improbable connections behind the power of poppers. What emerges is not just a history of pub raids, viral panics, and pecs the size of dinner plates, it is a collection of fresh and provocative ideas about identity, sex, utopia, capitalism, law, freedom, and the bodies that we use to experience the world.