The Repressed Sexuality of Victorian England

By Leigh Court

The buzz is that New York publishers are buying ‘hot historicals’ right now, and that’s good news for a lot of us, including me — I write erotic Victorian romance for Red Sage Publishing’s Secrets anthologies.

Queen Victoria had nine children, so let’s face it — she obviously knew a thing or two about sex. And yet, the Victorian era was noted for (among other things) its veneer of repressed sexuality. Why? Its strict set of moral standards was partly a reaction to the permissiveness of the previous Georgian era and Queen Victoria’s observations of how those loose morals affected people’s opinion of the monarchy.

And it probably didn’t help that when her husband Prince Albert died in 1861, she went into mourning, and wore black for the rest of her sixty-three year reign.

In fact, things got so somber in Merry Olde England that not only was the sight of a female ankle considered scandalous, even table legs were kept covered and out of sight! And yet it was also during this bleak time that Richard Francis Burton introduced the Kama Sutra to England. Burton was an exceptional soldier and explorer, but his most lasting legacy may have been bringing back a translation of writings by a celibate Indian scholar called Vatsyayana, about his people’s most basic beliefs and, um, well, er… practices. 

The Kama Sutra plays a big role in my latest Victorian novella THE BET, which is featured in Secrets Volume 27: Untamed Pleasures. My hero Damian Hunt, Viscount Atherton, brags to his friend George Beringer that he can… satisfy… a woman using just his words. The contention is so outrageous that George wagers his London townhouse Damian can’t do it, but insists the girl for the bet must be a virgin. Damian stands to lose his prized racehorse if he can’t make good on his audacious boast, so he plans on using the Kama Sutra to help in his verbal seduction. 

Of course, once Damian lays eyes on the virginal Claire, she is not what he expected, and all bets are off, so to speak! 

Chrissy Dionne of Romance Junkies gave THE BET a 5 Blue Ribbons review, and said “THE BET is Ms. Court’s second SECRETS novella and certainly has cemented herself a place on my authors to watch list.”   

I love reading and writing historical romances, so I, for one, am glad that
New York publishers are buying hot historicals. Everything old is new again!