The Intermediate Sex
	The Edward Carpenter Archive by Simon Dawson

Title Page and Introduction

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As the present pamphlet - though a continuation of the series already published, relating to questions of Sex - deals with a somewhat difficult branch of that subject, it has been thought advisable, at any rate in the first instance to printed for private circulation.

Carpenter's Book Homogenic Love has had an interesting history. He describes its birth in Chapter 11 of his biography, My Days and Dreams.

Early in 1894 I started writing a series of pamphlets on sex-questions - those questions which at that time were generally tabooed and practically not discussed at all, though they now have become almost an obsession of the public mind. As pamphlets of that kind would have no chance with the ordinary publishers, I got them printed and issued by the Manchester Labour Press - a little association for the spread of Socialist literature, on the committee of which I was. The pamphlets were Sex-love, Woman, and Marriage; and they sold pretty well - three or four thousand copies each. Encouraged by their success I began early in '95 to put them together, and add fresh matter to them, till I had a book ready for publication - which I afterwards entitled Love's Coming-of-Age. This book I offered to Fisher Unwin (as he was already selling Towards Democracy) and he accepted it - undertaking to produce the book himself and give me a fair Royalty. His Agreement was signed in June 1895.

Meanwhile, in January 1895 (though dated 1894) I issued from the Labour Press, and in the same connection as the other pamphlets, a fourth one entitled Homogenic Love - which I suppose was among the first attempts in this country to deal at all publicly with the problems of the Intermediate Sex. I placed "printed for private circulation only" on the Title-page, and had only a comparatively small number of copies struck off - which were not sold but sent round pretty freely to those who I thought would be interested in the subject or able to contribute views or information upon it. My object in fact was to get in touch with others and to obtain material for future study or publication. Even in this quiet way the pamphlet created some alarm - and in the dove-cotes of Fleet Street (as I heard) caused no little fluttering and agitation; but it is quite possible the matter would have ended there, if it had not been for the Oscar Wilde troubles. Wilde was arrested in April 1895 and from that moment a sheer panic prevailed over all questions of sex, and especially of course questions of the Intermediate Sex.

Carpenter goes on to describe how he was seen as taboo in the publishing world and struggled to get his books published. Eventually he was forced to publish Love's Coming Of Age through the Labour Press in Manchester in 1896. This was a book about gender and sexuality from a heterosexual perspective (which Carpenter says should have been written by woman) and which eventually sold amazingly well - as Carpenter relates.

I had, one day, to call upon a well-known London publisher (who was already publishing some of my books, though he had refused this particular one) on business, and having discussed the matters immediately in hand, he presently turned to me and inquired how my Love's Coming-of-Age was selling. I of course gave a fairly favorable account. "I think," said he in a somewhat chastened tone "that perhaps we made rather a mistake in refusing some little time back to take it up. A Sunday or two ago I was at church [probably a Congregational or Unitarian Chapel], and the minister quoted a page or two from your book, and spoke very highly of it, and actually gave the published address and price, and all; and I saw quite a lot of people noting the references, down." He paused, and then added, "Quite a good advertisement - worth thirty or forty copies I daresay."

Despite this progress it wasn't until 1908 that Carpenter was able to publish "The Intermediate Sex", his thoughts on homosexuality much expanded from Homogenic Love. Even then publishing any book about homosexuality was still a sensitive issue, and in 1909 there was a formal investigation by the Director of Public Prosecutions and Derbyshire Police into whether Carpenter's books, or his conduct, shoud face prosecution for indecency. Fortunately it went nowhere.