They say Lady Byron is in a race to publish the latest, and Unutterably Wicked, edition of the Lyre of Erato before the Ministry finds her hidden press.
They say Sinning Jenny blushed on reading the proofs.
They say the Church is considering a ban on reading.
They say certain members of Society have been banished to the Tomb Colonies simply for saying the word “lyre.”
They say the Hedonism cap will be shattered.
They say the Bazaar’s collection will be complete.
Sounds like a most wonderful work. I’d be delighted to read some of those papers, a few months in the Tomb Colonies would be so worth destroying the Hedonist cap!
Lady Byron’s 28 November 1896 edition of the Lyre of Erato was published; sadly however, her distribution network had been thoroughly infiltrated by the Ministry of Public Decency and no copies of the paper reached their intended destinations. The full depths of London’s salacious facts and fantasies must remain unplumbed …
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Or so one would believe where it not for a handful of patrons of a certain forbidden stage production having found in their playbills a short and heavily-expurgated excerpt alleged to have originated in that most infamous edition. Mayhap one or two copies may yet be extant.
The excerpt is reproduced below:
The [censored] was [censored] with much power, and attracted universal attention. It was [censored] into various [censored], and called forth a multitude of [censored] and [censored] in all parts of [censored]. Strong men [censored] against it, especially in London, and among them a few dignitaries of the Church; but the [censored] generally [censored] the [censored] with joy. Addison [censored] it in a [censored] [censored], and for nearly a [censored] it exercised a strong influence upon [censored] [censored], and aided to plant more deeply than ever the [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored] [censored]; whereas, [censored] [censored] brought on the Flood, it was beautiful in its "egg-shaped form," and free from every imperfection.
A few years later came [censored] [censored] of the highest [censored]—[Censored] [Censored], professor at [Censored], who in [censored] [censored] his New [Censored] of the [Censored]. Unlike [Censored], he endeavoured to avail himself of the Newtonian [censored], and brought in, to aid the [censored] catastrophe caused by human [censored], a [censored], which broke open "the fountains of the great deep."
