Dorian Book Quarterly, vol. 3, no. 3
San Francisco: Pan-Graphic Press, July–August–September 1962
General Research Division
Dorian Book Quarterly
For publishers like the Pan-Graphic Press that focused specifically on LGBTQ+ publications, censorship and obscenity laws were of particular importance. The Pan-Graphic Press used its publication Dorian Book Quarterly—part journal, part mail-order catalog—to keep its readers up-to-date with the ever-changing obscenity laws. Printed from 1960 to 1964, Dorian Book Quarterly mixed censorship news with advertising for the press’s other publications.
The 1962 July–August–September volume offers a detailed overview of ongoing legal changes and focuses on matters that would impact Dorian Book Quarterly as a publication. Of particular interest is the conversation about the meaning of words such as “obscene,” “pornography,” “erotica,” and “public versus private,” and where to draw the line between these terms and art. Pan-Graphic Press’s founder, Hal Call, would go on to open the first gay bookstore in the country, Adonis Books, in San Francisco in 1967, when obscenity and censorship laws were still haunting graphic gay material and publications.
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