Felix Delbrueck ([log in to unmask]) wrote:

>To make a not necessarily helpful generalization here: the English are
>sex maniacs, whereas the Germans have an anal fixation.  In other words:
>German humour and coarse language seem to me to tend more towards the
>scatological, whereas English smut focuses on sex.

But this is fairly recent - probably (I'm sure it would be in Partridge
somewhere) 19th century.  Well, not so sure about smut in general, but
certainly what was considered obscene language has changed from the
religious (which it still is in French I believe) to the sexual.

When characters in Restoration Comedies and Sheridan's plays exclaim
"Zounds!" they were using coarse language - zounds is a contraction of
"By God's (or possibly Jesus') wounds" and was a form of blasphemy.

The overtly sexual language which we find in authors like Shakespeare
and Chaucer was not considered obscene in their day.

I'm sure Steve S will correct whatever I have misremembered in the
above.

Deryk Barker
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