Some of them are quite shocking

bioscope.jpg

Back to the history of the word Bioscope. This postcard dates from 1904. It portrays a bioscope show, with lecturer, orchestra, and speech bubble comments from the audience. The comments include: “Remember I’m a married man,” “Kiss me quick, this is the last picture,” and “Can they see us?” On the back of the postcard, there is the handwritten comment, “This one is rather amusing I think. Don’t you? They are quite the latest style here. Some of them are quite shocking.” The postcard was sent from Dover. Interestingly, the image on the screen is a circular one, indicating that the artist was confused by the difference between motion pictures (which were square) and magic lantern slides (which did sometimes feature circular images).

4 responses

  1. Hi we have this card as well in our collection – part of a new series of Edwardian and Victorian ephemera entertainment that we will be digitising and cataloging over the next 18 months

  2. It’s also reproduced in my book, ‘I want to see this Annie mattygraph’, p.118 – Fred Lake found it for me.

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