1 online resource (viii, 438 pages) :

The fascinating, untold story of the history of undressing: over fifty years of taking it off. Striptease combined sexual display and parody, cool eros and wisecracking Bacchanalian humor. Striptease could be savage, patriotic, irreverent, vulgar, sophisticated, sentimental, and subversive--sometimes, all at once. In this vital cultural history, Rachel Shteir traces the ribald art from its nineteenth century vaudeville roots, through its long and controversial career, to its decline during the liberated 1960s. The book argues that striptease is an American form of popular entertainment--maybe the most American form of popular entertainment. Based on exhaustive research and filled with rare photographs and period illustrations, Striptease recreates the combustible mixture of license, independence, and sexual curiosity that allowed strippers to thrive for nearly a century. Shteir brings to life striptease's Golden Age, the years between the Jazz Age and the Sexual Revolution, when strippers performed around the country, in burlesque theatres, nightclubs, vaudeville houses, carnivals, fairs, and even in glorious palaces on the Great White Way. Taking us behind the scenes, Rachel Shteir introduces us to a diverse cast of characters that collided on the burlesque stage, from tight-laced political reformers and flamboyant impresarios, to drag queens, shimmy girls, cootch dancers, tit serenaders, and even girls next door, lured into the profession by big-city aspirations

Throughout the book, readers will find essential profiles of famed performers, including Gypsy Rose Lee, "the Literary Stripper"; Lili St. Cyr, the 1950s mistress of exotic striptease; and Blaze Starr, the "human heat wave," who literally set the stage on fire. Striptease is an insightful and entertaining portrait of an art form at once reviled and embraced by the American public. Blending careful research and vivid narration, Rachel Shteir captures striptease's combination ofsham and seduction while illuminating its surprisingly persistent hold on the American imagination. -- from publisher description

Includes bibliographical references and index

"A startled fawn upon the stage" -- Legs -- "Yvette goes to bed": the first undressing acts -- From Ziegfeld to Minsky: respectable undressing and the rise of modern burlesque -- After the doughboys returned: nudity in burlesque and on broadway -- The first strippers and teasers -- Pansies, reformers, and a "frenzy of congregate cootchers": the birth of modern striptease -- A pretty girl is like a melody, sort of -- The burlesque soul of striptease -- "Minskyville" -- "I never made any money until I took my pants off": fans and bubbles around the nation -- "Temporary entertainment for morons and perverts": LaGuardia kicks striptease out of New York -- Gypsy -- From literary strippers to queens of burlesque -- "Clamouring for a table and pounding for an encore": striptease at the world's fair -- Striptease during wartime -- The private lives of strippers -- Stripty-second streets -- The seamy sides of striptease -- Striptease confidential -- You've gotta get a gimmick -- Topless dancing -- 1969: who killed striptease?

Print version record

Electronic reproduction. [S.l.] : HathiTrust Digital Library

Master and use copy. Digital master created according to Benchmark for Faithful Digital Reproductions of Monographs and Serials, Version 1. Digital Library Federation, December 2002

digitized 2010

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