“Cabells eighth (and best-known) book, ‘Jurgen, A Comedy of Justice’ (1919), was the subject of a celebrated obscenity case shortly after its publication. […] The novel was denounced by the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice; they attempted to bring a prosecution for obscenity. The case went on for two years before Cabell and his publisher, Robert M. McBride, won: the ‘indecencies’ were double entendres that also had a perfectly decent interpretation […] Cabell took an authors revenge: the revised edition of 1926 included a previously ‘lost’ passage in which the hero is placed on trial by the Philistines, with a large dung-beetle as the chief prosecutor. He also wrote a short book, Taboo, in which he thanks John H. Sumner and the Society for Suppression of Vice for generating the publicity that gave his career a boost. Due to the notoriety of the suppression of Jurgen, Cabell became a figure of international fame.”
Posted on: Thu, 10 Jul 2014 10:13:01 +0000
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