Preface

No detailed explanation and analysis of the cards is offered; the readers are left to make of the cards what they will, as if they were confronted by the spectacle of the cards in an actual London phone booth.

The desired effect happens every time; people are shocked, amused and bewildered when viewing the six-hundered and one cards in the book.

Here is the text of the preface:

“There are many anonymous, co-existing sub-worlds, all superimposed upon each other in a large city. Some like a bad rash, make their presence known via the flaky, red, sore skin that flares up for no apparent reason; call this symptom 'Telephone Booth Excema'.

An individuals experience of a city bears only a small relation to the actual broad bandwith, multiplexed, noise like structure that is a large urban grouping. This is one filtered out facet of the metropolitan London signal.

This collection was begun in 1984, out of the surprise and shock of seeing so many different cards, ans so many unrecocnised perversions. What was surprising was the number of 'kinks' that were catered 4; as can be seen in the collection, the permutations of perversion seem to evolve and mutate; cross linking and combining into a startling spectrum of services.

There is a recurring theme that runs through many of the cards; the theme of dreams. Dreams come true, dreams to reality, but just what sort of dreams are these? The 'Missionary Position is sex' brigade would doubtless say that these are not dreams at all but nightmares, nightmares made real; Hell on Earth, the smell of rubber, leather, blood, sweat and ionized air mingling together to to form the perfume-stench at the edge of the Lake Of Fire. All of this can be initiated by a phone call.

British Telecom have created special squads whose only purpose is to remove the possibility of anyone making an appointment with, shall we say, Madame Stern. But as soon as the cards are removed, new ones appear within minutes. The armies of card posters made up of vagrants, pensioners and kids, are constantly one step ahead of the BT cleanup squads, insuring that there are hundreds of thousands of cards perpetualy on display.

The orighinal crop of cards in this book came in the form of adhesive stickers. These were very problematic for BT, causing a huge mess when they were removed either badly or completely; a badly removed sticker left a white underlayer behind, a completely removed example left scratch marks from where the sharp scrapers were used to lift the offending invitations. There was an attempt made by BT to chemically treat the inside glass of often targeted booths with an anti-adhesive spray, which was an unusually clever and superb maneuver. This spray made it easy for the BT squads to remove the stickers completely without scraping. A spinoff effect was that it also made the avid collectors job of gathering cool items much easier; a sticker in a treated booth came off in about ten seconds; previously the same sticker in an untreated booth would take up to 10 minutes for a clean peel! How many times we stood, holding up people waiting to use the phone! One strategy to deflect attention was to simply pick up the handset and pretend to talk, whilst carefully (looking uninterested in the sticker) peeling away the prize. At some time, there was an informal, secret accord between the card makers and BT. The stickers suddenly stopped appearing, and pure non-adhesive cards took over. We believe that there must have been some kind of agreement, because stickers are far preferable to cards; cards get taken away by anyone and the wind. They are often thrown onto the floor of the booths, and abused in other ways. Stickers remain. They have a longer life, and are thus the medium of choice..

Are the services on the cards prostitution? If paying to have your head squeezed between someones fat thighs is sex, then the answer is yes. If paying to have someone take off your bowler hat and suit to be replaced with a wig, girdle and high heels is sex then the answer is yes. If paying someone to have ones 'erection demolished' is sex then the answer is yes. If paying for the priveledge of bringing notes to a high heeled woman like a dog is sex, then the answer is yes; one must suppose that it IS prostitution. So what?

Much is made of certain mens desire to be dominated by astrong woman, but the exact details of the mechanics of these operations is rarely revealed. These cards are a glimpse into the twisted clockwork of the minds of the people who make use of the special services promised on the cards, and there must be tens of thousands of clients who use these services, otherwise, the proliferation of card posting would not have been as steady as it has been. At first cards were only seen in the West End of London. Now they are appearing in ever stronger numbers in places like Fulham which has never had any cards in its booths untill recently.

Anyone who has studied A-level (!) Maths will have no problem in seeing the many types of these cards as an exersise in permutation.

The selection in this book represents the cream of the crop. Only the most bizzare cards were peeled whenever the collectors went on any expedition. All inferior cards were left behind.

Some of the fetishes portrayed in the collection are almost comprehensible. A few are absolutely beyond definition. For example, what does it mean to a 'punter' when he or she is meant to be enticed by a picture of a bald man vomitting a pair of dice?And what hidden pleasures becon in the phrase; 'Strictly for you, I rule with arbitrary sway'? Whatever the logic behind these apparently unfathomable invitations DO NOT DIAL ANY OF THE NUMBERS THAT APPEAR ON THE CARDS IN THIS BOOK. In most cases, BT has either cut off the numbers or re-allocated them to little old ladies who have nothing to do with the services on the cards. Try not to act retarded.”

Read the Preface

Look inside the Irdialani Gallery

Read the Press Release

Read an Account of Book Launch

View on line Gallery of vice cards

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