John Saul (prostitute)

John Saul
Born
Johannes Saul

(1857-10-29)29 October 1857
Dublin, Ireland
Died28 August 1904(1904-08-28) (aged 46)
Our Lady's Hospice, Harold's Cross, Ireland
Resting placeGlasnevin Cemetery, Glasnevin, Dublin, Ireland
Other namesDublin Jack
Known forDublin Castle scandal
Cleveland Street scandal
The Sins of the Cities of the Plain
Parent(s)Guilelmus Saul
Eliza Revington Saul

John Saul (29 October 1857 – 28 August 1904), also known as Jack Saul, and Dublin Jack, was an Irish prostitute. He featured in two major homosexual scandals, and as a character in two works of pornographic literature of the period. Considered "notorious in Dublin and London" and "made infamous by the sensational testimony he gave in the Cleveland Street scandal",[1] which was published in newspapers around the world, he has recently[when?] been the subject of scholarly analysis and speculation. One reason is the paucity of information on the lives and outlook of individual male prostitutes of the period.[2] Saul has also come to be seen by some as a defiant individual in a society that sought to repress him: "a figure of abjection who refuses his status".[3]

  1. ^ Cohen, A. William Sex Scandal: The Private Parts of Victorian Fiction, Duke University Press, Durham and London, 1996, p123
  2. ^ Coleman, Jonathan Rent: Same-Sex Prostitution in Modern Britain, 1885-1957, University of Kentucky, 2014, p. 10
  3. ^ Kaplan, Morris (1999). "Who's Afraid of John Saul? Urban Culture and the Politics of Desire in Late Victorian London". GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies. 5 (3): 267–314. doi:10.1215/10642684-5-3-267. S2CID 140452093.