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Dear editors,
I am very much interested in corsets, devouring any information I can get on the subject, be it in print or on the internet.
This includes your Corsetletter, which pleases me exceptionally. Taking a good look at all the resources, both 'historic' and 'modern', one can not fail to notice that there's a great difference between the two. Nearly all current websites and all publications show the magnificent figures of Ethel Granger, Spook and Cathie Jung, extremely corseted people that I however think of as hampering the positive further development of the corset scene.
I am not convinced that these ladies don't suffer any health damage, apart from whether they have surgically had ribs removed. I'm obviously sceptic.
I don't consider these extreme shapes to be aesthetic. They go beyond their historic examples.
This is of course my personal preference, and as such possibly not suited for your Corsetletter. I think however, that many women in "true daily life" that come eye to eye with a corset for the first time, are scared off by these extremely corseted figures, which would be a shame. Dealing with the corset theme from this pointy of view may satisfy the fetishists, but "ordinary" people -and hence potential enthusiast corsetwearers- will think of us as plain crazy. Calling attention to this point of view is why I wrote to you.
People with a waist laced to "only" 19, 22 or 27 for that matter, can be just as interesting and marvellous. Besides, there are quite a few more of those than there are 'Ethel Grangers'.
Love from Vaals (The Netherlands), Sabine (58 cm)
From the editors
Sabine, you touch upon a topic that is certainly alive in the corset world.
We too are of the opinion that beauty is not determined by the most extremely tight-laced waist, whomever it may belong to.
It is in the ratio or combination of bust, corseted waist and hips that we regard a figure as beautiful or not.
The extremely tight-laced ladies we know, both contemporary and mainly thanks to photography- from the past, may not be that many, but they did contribute to 'shape' the notion of the corset as we now know it.
They greatly contributed to the (renewed) popularity of the corset as an erotic garment, apart from whether or not excess may be harmful, not meaning to the lady's health, but to the image of the corset.
From publicised material, we know that there have been corsetwearing ladies that had their lower ribs removed. We know this is not the case with both Ethel Granger and Cathie Jung, with Cathie Jung's publicised X-rays as proof.
We know Cathie personally, and we are not under the impression that Cathie is suffering from corset-related health problems, and do keep in mind that in the meantime, the age of sixty is behind her.
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Photo: Bob and Cathie Jung in magnificent Victorian outfit during The Brilliant Ball, in the U.S.A. last year.
In March this year, there were two German television broadcasts with Cathie Jung appearing. They were edited in such a way however, that after Cathie's appearances, a physician stated that wearing corsetry is harmful to one's health.
We think it truly deplorable to see the corset being dealt with in this way.
From experience, e.g. readers contributions such as Sabine's in this issue, we know that many people take pleasure in their corset, without particularly tight lacing. Furthermore, we know that wearing corsetry on a more regular basis, enables one torealise a further waist reduction and not encounter any health problems. With pregnant women, the internal organs are also repositioned without any harm.
We therefore, keep surrounding the phenomenon of corsetry with positive public relations, knowing that we reach out and please a large number of people, whether or not they wear a corset themselves.
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