The Decadent Handbook Edited by Rowan Pelling Dedalus, 372pp, £15 ISBN 1903517303

Lock up your daughters! Finally, someone has seen fit to publish a guide for the modern decadent, the velvet-jacketed, absinthe-quaffing, pan-sexual, drug-sniffing wretch that is to be found adorning our society's basest hang-outs. Rowan Pelling, the former editor of the late, lamented Erotic Review, is an excellent choice as editor, despite being, in the words of Sebastian Horsley, a contributor here, "about as decadent as the St Trinian's hockey team". She ties together a range of subjects and writers, from Roman incest to DVD pornography and from the Earl of Rochester to Belle de Jour, all with knowingly subversive relish.

The book is far from perfect. For one thing, it suffers from a surfeit of grubby-palmed fiction that belongs more in the sphere of pornography than decadence. Anyone wishing to understand anything about decadence as a cultural or social movement is likely to be disappointed; despite the erudition of many of the collaborators, who include Alan Jenkins and Louise Welsh, this is no dry textbook. Nevertheless, Pelling marshals the filth and depravity with a firm hand, and ensures that this collection of louche immorality, dry intelligence and really excellent breakfast suggestions entertains and stimulates throughout its purple pages.

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