First, the Erotic Review announced that it is going online-only, ending its fifteen-year print history. The June issue – its 110th – is available to download now.
Next, news leaked out that Scarlet magazine, a glossy for the sexually liberated woman, is closing.
Then there was confusion surrounding Forum magazine after its publisher, Trojan, went into administration. Once the storm calmed, Forum – another magazine that runs sizeable sex features – revealed to its readers that it was not withdrawing from print but rebranding as Foreplay.
What all these magazines have in common – apart from carrying adverts for vibrators – is that they explore sex intellectually for an educated, open-minded readership. Their longest word is not 36DD and none of them go anywhere near the top shelf.
Yet there is something prognostic in the notion that all three have been forced to rethink their business models. Do sex and thinking really pair off that badly? Is it really the case that titillation can not be high-brow? Can a British readership only engage in sexual subject matter in the form of a cheap snigger from a porno?
I think not. I think the problem can be blamed on our bashfulness towards sex rather than a lack of intellectual issues to explore around the theme itself. There are probably hundreds of people who've thought twice about buying a copy of Scarlet more for fear of being seen with it than because of a disinterest in the features inside.
I write a monthly column for the Erotic Review, I am a contributor to Forum and I write for national newspapers on a range of issues related to sex. So I'm more than confident that there are plenty of noble issues in amongst the smut, and I don't think these magazines have been driven from the mainstream for lack of a hungry audience.
The Erotic Review does an laudable job of mixing humour with sex and over the years has attracted great writers such as Auberon Waugh and Sarah Waters. Forum seeks out originality and covers in-depth features about sex in different cultures. Scarlet captured the modern, educated, forward thinking woman, brave enough to celebrate her sex.
Yet in the last week these three titles have been rebranded, reformatted and axed. Jamie Maclean, editor of the Erotic Review refuses to concede it is due to lack of market demand: "I'm sure Alan Sugar would agree, you can have a brilliant product but if your distribution isn't right you won't become a millionaire. Ideally we wanted to put the Erotic Review in bookshops. We got it into Borders but then it went bust. There was lots of bias against us and we had to fight against priggish and prudish attitudes at both branch and corporate level. As in the whole industry of erotic publishing we struggled against a strong, but not entirely evident, censorship – an invisible censorship."
Sarah Berry, editor of Forum – which is to become Foreplay – also alludes to indirect censorship: "I think the problem is partly because we're seen as seedy; but also because people don't necessarily know we're there. A lot of newsagents won't allow top shelf magazines and distribution is down.
"We cover all sorts of things for the voyeur to the player to the sex worker. We're not sensationalist – we're a community, a home for different ways of thinking that we allow to flourish."
The events of the last week have left a gap in the print market for intelligent sex literature. When the new Foreplay magazine launches it also has plans to go online only, indicating that for those readers keen to give the theme of sex some cerebral effort, the web is their only option. Yet porn, soft-core lads mags and the less engaging erotic chic lit continue to chug along.
It is unlikely that this gap will be filled though, because whoever tries will likely have their attempts hampered by a culture of embarrassment and assumptions. Despite the sharp wit of the Erotic Review, the daring of Forum and the dynamism of Scarlet, most consumers – and distributors it seems – assume that these titles are full of dirty pictures and gags about whips and chains.
Maclean, however, sees a silver lining in the switch to online. He says the Erotic Review has great plans to introduce video content for its online subscribers, produced with the same signature humour as its written features.
"This is what is incredibly hopeful. Now people won't have the embarrassment of purchasing an erotica magazine or facing the postman delivering it. They can download it – it's much simpler."
According to Maclean the title's move online has had support from all its subscribers, with the exception of one 93-year-old long-term reader who expressed frustration that he had given up on using a computer long ago and given it to his dog to chew.
The first e-edition of the Erotic Review, including Helen's column, can be found at www.eroticreviewmagazine.com.
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