MORE ON STEWART HOME'S NOVEL CUNT

The News Story
"Nearly 30 printers have taken the name of The Do Not Press rather too literally, by refusing to print Stewart Home's latest novel Cunt. In addition, the WH Smith and John Menzies chains are refusing to stock the book, as are some branches of Dillons and Ottakar's. As if that wasn't enough of a setback, the publisher suffered a dawn raid by Scotland Yard's Obscene Publications Squad, which resulted in the seizure of art work, computer disks and a manuscript. However, publisher Jim Driver believes that the men from the Met will be disappointed with their haul. "To be honest, the manuscript is no more obscene than many pieces of literary fiction that ourselves and other publishers have put out in the past without a fuss," he says. "The only sticking point is the title." Driver still intends to go ahead with publication, and is hoping that the original publication date of 13 May can be maintained. The publisher's distributor Turnaround reports that subs have been "reasonably healthy all things taken into account". If the police are satisfied and a printer can be found, Cunt (ISBN 1899344454) will be a B-format paperback original, retailing at £7.50." Publishing News 9 April 1999.

"We are writing to complain about the coverage given to Stewart Home's new book in your sidelines section (TO 1498. We are a group of women who are fighting back against the misrepresentation of our gender through the use of violent and often patriarchal language. We believe the title and content of 'Cunt', his latest outing to be deeply oppressive to women. It makes a mockery of the primordial power of women's reproductive ability and reduces this very personal and private aspect of women's bodies to an obscene insult. We do not think that his work should be promoted. Perhaps Home could consider 'Prick' as the title of his autobiography? Kim Fowley, Esther Wiggins et al, Women Against Violent Language. E15." Time Out 19 May 1999.

"With regard to the letter about my novel 'Cunt' from Women Against Violent Language (TO 1500): It is difficult to see how this group was able to make any kind of informed statement about the content of my book at a time when it was not available. The fact that WAVL suggest I should call my autobiography 'Prick' shows how little they know about me or my work. Autobiography is for bourgeois plonkers, so I shall leave no memoirs. Likewise, 'Cunt; is a post-modern variant on the picaresque novel and this genre's name is derived from the Spanish 'picar' meaning 'to wound lightly' or 'to prick'. So from the form of the book you get the male sexual organs and from the title female genitalia. In other words, by fucking with literature I'm kicking against the patriarchal pricks who want to constitute themselves as centred subjects. I appreciate TO covering attempts to censor my books and find it funny that WAVL's intervention should lead to the cover of 'Cunt' being reproduced for a second time in the magazine. Such publicity won't harm sales of the book. Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke. Stewart Home, WC1." Time Out 26 May 1999.

There was more coverage in both Publishing News & Time Out but we won't reproduce it all here. Also Feminists Against Censorship sent a letter supporting the book to Time Out which appeared in the same issue as the missive from Stewart Home.

Back Cover Blurb
This is what Bukowski would have sounded like if he'd had balls and a seriously bad attitude towards teenage girls.

David Kelso is a writer who claims to be so lacking in imagination that his fiction isn't fiction.

Regardless of whether the backdrop is the Baltic city of Tallin, or the remote Callanish standing stones, Kelso's primary preoccupation is sex. And although the pace of the sexual action never slows, he is occasionally forced to fake his results. As he nears the end of a trilogy in which he describes tracking down and re-screwing the first thousand women he ever had, Kelso loses the plot - literally.

Sexual violence, violent sex, threesomes, gang-bangs, murder, mayhem and more bad taste than you can shake an ejaculating dick at make this the most authoritative account of pathological sadism ever written.

The book was published almost to schedule when the 43rd printer Do Not Press approached agreed to take on the job as long as the title wasn't included on the spine or typeset on the front and back covers. A photographic image of an identity bracelet on a wrist engraved with the word 'Cunt', the printer deemed as acceptable.

Synopsis of Cunt

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