Books about Burlesque from Amazon.com

On one side, Dita Von Teese shares the beauty of the burlesque world, with bubblegum dreams and show tunes to strip to. Flip over for fantasies in fetish with dramatic costumes and the allure of submission

Burlesque and the Art of the Teese

"I advocate glamour. Every day. Every minute."

I'm a good dancer and a nice girl, but I'm a great showgirl. I sell, in a word, magic. Burlesque is a world of illusion and dreams and of course, the striptease. Whether I am bathing in my martini glass, riding my sparkling carousel horse, or emerging from my giant gold powder compact, I live out my most glamorous fantasies by bringing nostalgic imagery to life.

Let me show you my world of gorgeous pin-ups, tantalizing stripteases, and femmes fatales. I'll give you a glimpse into my life, but a lady never reveals all.

Fetish and the Art of the Teese

You may have come for the fetish. Or you may just be sneaking a peek at this mysterious and peculiar other side. No matter what you've come for, there is something for you to indulge in.

My world of fetish may not be the one that you would expect. As a burlesque performer, I entice my audience, bringing their minds closer and closer to sex and then -- as good temptress must -- snatching it away. As a fetish star, I apply the same techniques. . . .

An opera-length kid leather glove, a strict wasp waist, an impossibly high patent leather heel, a severely painted red lip. . . . Come with me into my world of decadent fetishism.

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Decreed by David Letterman (tongue in cheek) on CBS TV’s The Late Show to be the pick of “Dave’s Book Club 2006,” Candy Girl is the story of a young writer who dared to bare it all as a stripper At the age of twenty-four, Diablo Cody decided there had to be more to life than typing copy at an ad agency. She soon managed to find inspiration from a most unlikely source— amateur night at the seedy Skyway Lounge. While she doesn’t take home the prize that night, Diablo discovers to her surprise the act of stripping is an absolute thrill.

This is Diablo’s captivating fish-out-of-water story of her yearlong walk on the wild side, from quiet gentlemen’s clubs to multilevel sex palaces and glassed-in peep shows. In witty prose she gives readers a behind-the-scenes look at this industry through a writer’s keen eye, chronicling her descent into the skin trade and the effect it had on her self-image and her relationship with her now husband..
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For the first time, stunning images of the women of the burlesque stage are gathered together in one great volume. In period photographs the timeless beauty of those exotic women who titillated, teased, and sometimes tortured their audiences is captured and celebrated. These memorable images make it clear that, when it comes to a beautiful body and a gorgeous face, tastes change very little. And just as in the past, the imagination is encouraged to run wild and ponder what might have been. This is a book to relax with and enjoy over and over again. Its rich, nostalgic view of a bygone era in American entertainment will please everyone, men and women alike. A "revealing" piece of Americana!.
Price: $13.42 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Though burlesque has survived in the back of our cultural consciousness after being pushed aside by modern stripping in the '50s, the revival that began in the early '90s has finally brought burlesque back to the forefront of popular culture.

Evolving from an underground movement to a nearly mainstream fetish, neo-burlesque embraces a wide variety of modern interpretations all based on the classic bump and grind and "taking it off" with a wink and a smile. From classic tributes to punk rock revisionists, women of all ages, sizes, and backgrounds are rediscovering burlesque and reinventing it. A sense of heightened imagination, empowerment and energy are being delivered to the stage, perhaps even more so than during the historic heyday, the Golden Age of Burlesque.

Slipping behind the scene, Burlesque and the New Bump-n-Grind undresses the issues of feminism, modern popularity, and what exactly draws the unique and varied audience members to the shows. The women-and men!-of burlesque also receive their fleshed-out dues by a categorized peek into the various troupe styles including classical, re-creationists, revivalists, modern, circus, performance art, political, queer, bawdy singers and comics.

Peppered throughout the book are full-color and black-and-white photographs that fully instill the picturesque dance into the reader's mind.

Founder of one of the first neo-burlesque troupes, author Michelle Baldwin (a.k.a, Vivienne Va-Voom) has helped to bring the lost art of burlesque back to the forefront of pop culture. Baldwin has served as the creative director, choreographer, music director, costumer, financial head, and performer for her troupe, "Burlesque As It Was." Her deep immersion into this art form has provided her with a rare view into the growth and evolution of the revival.

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First song, dress on…

“It sounds like an obvious statement when I say that girls don’t grow up wanting to be strippers, but you’d be surprised. Most people – civilians that is – seem to think that even in the cradle we were wrapping ourselves around a greasy pole and grinding our hips to Britney Spears.…When we get drunk the regrets come out. ‘I’m a good girl, really I am,’ sighs one. She takes a drag of her cigarette and I think to myself, I’m not a good girl. Not really. Not anymore. But I sure as hell would like to be.”

With forty-three countries, twelve boats, dozens of flights, a fistful of “life experience” behind her and a lot of ambition fueling her dreams, twenty-five-year old Ruth Fowler arrives in New York City. A Brit with a Cambridge degree and a middle-class background, she doesn’t think it will be too hard to start a new life. But getting a work visa in post-9/11 U.S.A. proves to be tricky, and to kick-start a writing career, Fowler starts documenting her experiences. She funds her efforts with cash-in-hand jobs and a stint writing for The Village Voice, but it doesn’t take long for funds and hope to run out – sending her to the heart of Manhattan's dark underbelly, the strip clubs and “Champagne Rooms” of Times Square. As “Mimi,” she has a chance of survival. But when this persona threatens to consume every vestige of Fowler’s identity, when her life spirals out of control and her true self remains so deeply buried that it seems impossible to resurrect, relying on “Mimi” seems like the biggest mistake she has ever made. No Man’s Land is a shocking, raw account about losing identity—and finding it again..
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The field of cabaret performance is creative, full of opportunity and excitement--and it's booming! Here is the first book to show performers the ins and outs of mounting a cabaret act. Talented entertainers need to know both the creative and business aspects involved: choosing the right material, finding a music director, selecting wardrobe; structuring the act, getting bookings, publicizing the act; and even making a CD of it.

Bob Harrington was cabaret columnist for Back Stage until his tragic death in 1995. Sherry Eaker, editor-in-chief of Back Stage and editor of The Back Stage Handbook for Performing Artists, lives in New York City..
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It was from his experience on the Mississippi that Samuel Clemens took his nom de plume — Mark Twain, the call used by riverboat pilots when taking soundings of the river. The nom de plume was especially appropriate for Clemens, reflecting both his love of the Mississippi and his wry sense of humor. This Library of Literary Classics edition contains his best works including: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Prince and the Pauper, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court.
This deluxe edition is bound in padded leather with luxurious gold-stamping on the front and spine, satin ribbon marker and gilded edges. Other titles in this series include: Charlotte & Emily Bronte: The Complete Novels; Edgar Allan Poe: Selected Works; William Shakespeare: The Complete Works; Charles Dickens: Four Complete Novels; Lewis Carroll: The Complete, Fully Illustrated Works; and Jane Austen: The Complete Novels..
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Liz Goldwyn's lifelong fascination with the inimitable glamour of classic burlesque inspired her to spend the past eight years corresponding with, visiting, interviewing, receiving striptease lessons from, and forming close relationships with the last generation of the great American burlesque queeens. Goldwyn invites us to step back into an era when the hourglass figure was in vogue and striptease was a true art form.

Meet Betty "Ball of Fire" Rowland, who was known for her flaming red hair and bump–and–grind routines. (It turns out she once sued the author's grandfather, Samuel Goldwyn Jr., for using her stage name and costume in his Hollywood picture, Ball of Fire.)

Meet Sherry Britton, who, with her long black hair and curvy, trim physique, was among the most stunning of the burlesque stars before Mayor LaGuardia outlawed burlesque in New York.

Meet Zorita, whose sexually explicit "Consummation of the Wedding of the Snake" dance (performed with a live snake) and other daring performances earned her legendary status.

Goldwyn draws back the curtain to reveal the personal journeys of yesteryear's icons of female sexuality and power, restoring their legacy to an age that has all but forgotten them–despite today's resurgence of burlesque.

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Following the tremendous success of his first book on the subject, The Queens of Burlesque, Len Rothe has again pulled from his collection of original photographs of entertainers this delightful selection of over 100 images of Burlesque stars. Together with a revealing text that introduces burlesque to today's new audience, these photographs retain the surprise and teasing elements that endeared the dancers on stage in the heydays of burlesque shows, before television. In theaters throughout America, striptease dancers entertained grateful audiences. Here are Tempest Storm, Scarlett O'Hara, Lili St. Cyr, Georgia Sothern, and Zorita and her doves. With this book, they look out again with timeless beauty and show you the Bare Truth..
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