Elusive PN Dedeaux - Mystery Solved!!

One of my favorite writers and the one I always considered the "master" was PN Dedeaux. Unfortunately, I was never able to learn much about him other than a listing of his books.

Well, thanks to KJM, the mystery is now solved and the answer is in Wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_J._Offutt]

Now the reason none of us ever got a Goggle hit on this article is because they misspelled the name Dedeaux in the original article. (I've submitted the spelling correction and hopefully it will be updated soon.)

That's great Tiredny, much appreciated. Pre Internet his stories were gold. I always found some of his stories a bit severe (saying something for me) and he included some proclivities that was a little beyond my tastes, but he was a master at discipline writing.

I first became aware of him when he co-wrote with my all time favourite Martin Pyx (sometimes rendered Pix) - a man who was a great influence on my spanking writing.

For contributors here who don't know him he wrote Prussian Girls, and Jane Eyre (the alternative version).

Tiredny: One of my favorite writers and the one I always considered the "master" was PN Dedeaux.

Sometimes I forget that not everyone has been collecting as long as I have and it's clear that many never heard of PN Dedeaux. Well, below is a link to an introductory article:

https://www.literotica.com/s/dedeauxs-delightful-discipline

To me, PN Dedeaux was a pioneer. As the article above states his book the "The Nothing Things" influenced Martin Pyx's sorority series.

His book the "The Territory Within", in which he creates a universe where daily cp is the accepted norm, has spawned all kinds of books/stories. Indeed, my latest series on LSF is my attempt at creating a world similar to Dedeaux's.

Finally, if you are at all interested in the punishment of maids/servants, nobody re-creates this scene with realism and plausibility better than Dedeaux in the first few chapters of "The Tutor" aka "Thomasina".

For those looking to obtain ebooks, you might try:
http://triplexbooks.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=14486
http://triplexbooks.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=5909
http://triplexbooks.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=11994
http://triplexbooks.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=12937

Having written two short analyses at this site about Dedeaux's works and his possible identity, I'm of course interested in the possibility that he was a creation of Andrew Offutt. The referenced wikipedia site mentions one Dedeaux title: The Prussian Girls. My research pointed to Geoffrey Wagner as the likely author, and some added information about Wagner was provided at to the LSF Forum by Clifford Dorset. I did see the article in The NY Times Magazine by Offutt's son when it appeared. It sounds like he certainly was capable of being Dedeaux but whether he actually did write all of Dedeaux's novels remains unclear, at least to me.

Actually, the Wiki site only mentioned "The Prefect". I added "The Prussian Girls" as I have both and realize they are identical with the exception of the endings. (My guess is the endings were slightly modified to fit the typeset and even number of pages required by the printer.)

As for Offutt, I have some additional evidence in the form of text from one of the books attributed to John Cleve. The text I have is remarkably similar to the style of Dedeaux and further, within the text John Cleve even references "the punishers in Dedeaux's books". I mean, how in heaven's name would a science fiction author know about the very obscure Dedeaux? Unless ... unless ....

A writer like Offutt who turned out the incredible quantity of erotica that he did would very likely have known about Dedeaux whether or not he was Dedeaux. We're learning how many people who on the surface wouldn't seem to be involved in erotic or spanking lit are totally acquainted with lots of stuff we are more open about here.

Fuck - Offutt is dead? He died in 2013?

Fuck! I loved his Thieves World stories. And some of those hinted at spankings.

I hate it when one of the greats dies.

Fuck!

I've seen Dedeaux' work attributed elsewhere to Geoffrey Wagner and I read Leslie's article when it was posted. I don't know how the historical evidence stacks up, but based on style and tone, I'd lean strongly toward Wagner rather than Offutt. There is a cultured, well-read voice in Dedeaux' fiction that I can imagine an academic like Wagner producing. I've never seen anything like that voice in Offutt's fiction, and certainly Cleve's Spaceways series reads very differently from anything written by Dedeaux. If Dedeaux' stories are the work of Offutt, he must have been schizophrenic indeed.

Well, Mdare, it certainly is a bit confusing. I have some John Cleve (Offutt) excerpts that are remarkably close to Dedeaux's early works. Offutt even references Dedeaux and at the time of these excerpts, Dedeaux had very few titles out.

My "guess" is Dedeaux is a "house name" created by Barney Rosset, owner of Grove Press/Blue Moon. He'd decide upon the topic of a book (and in quite a bit a detail actually) and then contract out to a number of different authors to actually write the books. This "system" worked well for everyone. We must remember he was publishing during an era of censorship where people could be sent to jail. By having these "house names" it would protect the actual authors by NOT having a direct link to any body of work as they would with a pseudonym. Thus 40 years later it's still hard to know who wrote what.

The answer to "The Prefects" and "The Tutor" on who wrote resides in Box 218 in the Syracuse University Library. Maybe someday, they'll open to the public. In the meantime, I doubt Offutt's son has any reason to mislead and in addition, via his papers, he would be another avenue to verify authorship.

Tiredny, that's a good theory about the Blue Moon house names. It's certainly possible that Rosset may have assigned the name to more than one author, but my feeling is that more often a single work would appear under multiple pseudonyms. The Nothing Things, for example, also was published as Sorority of Submissive Girls under the name of Carl Buono.

Whatever the credited name, there was never any doubt in my mind when I came across a book by Dedeaux. His style and content were very distinct. The Prussian Girls (or The Prefect) was clearly one of them. It would not be the first time that a Wikipedia contributor got something wrong.

As for the NY Times Magazine article, it's very interesting, but, although Offutt's son says Offutt did work for Rosset, he never identifies Offutt as Dedeaux or credits any of Dedeaux' books to him. I read a lot of Offutt's sword & sorcery books when I was younger and several of the Spaceways series, and I always considered him an entertaining hack (sorry, Goodgulf) flitting from one junk-lit assignment to another. it's clear, though, from Offutt's son's account that Offutt was driven by a very demanding muse.

Nevertheless I'm unconvinced that he could have written any of Dedeaux' books. And I can't imagine Dedeaux ever countenancing a title like "Bondage Babes."