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Rating: Summary: Its Author Talks About ALY Review: When it was first published by Random House in June 1965, ALY, my biography of Prince Aly Khan, was an instant success. It appeared just as a new concept of morality was taking over from the Puritanism that had inhibited the USA from its earliest days. Sex had been something that consenting adults didn't discuss in public, contraceptives had been sold under the counter. and books and movies about sex were censored, if not banned. But a new day was dawning in America, demanded by younger people, spurred by the invention of The Pill. TV networks began to take Elvis Presley's pelvic gyrations for granted. "Hair," a musical with lots of nudism was a hit on Broadway. Playboy magazine was sold openly on newsstands. The success of my book ALY was part of that new frankness.It was chosen by Helen Gurley Brown to be featured in the first issue of Cosmopolitan she edited. The reborn Cosmo was the first women's magazine designed for the new American young woman -- liberated and sophisticated -- who wanted to read something more exciting than recipes and dress patterns. ALY was favorably reviewed in Newsweek, where I had worked for years. It made Time magazine's list of bestsellers. I had worked there too. It was syndicated to newspapers all over the country, none of which I had ever worked for. Most surprising of all the reviews was the favorable endorsement that appeared in The Atlantic, then the most staid of magazines, edited and published in Boston. Eventually ALY appeared in five foreign editions, including Japanese. Now it's back again, for a new and wiser generation. It's still fun reading.
Rating: Summary: Its Author Talks About ALY Review: When it was first published by Random House in June 1965, ALY, my biography of Prince Aly Khan, was an instant success. It appeared just as a new concept of morality was taking over from the Puritanism that had inhibited the USA from its earliest days. Sex had been something that consenting adults didn't discuss in public, contraceptives had been sold under the counter. and books and movies about sex were censored, if not banned. But a new day was dawning in America, demanded by younger people, spurred by the invention of The Pill. TV networks began to take Elvis Presley's pelvic gyrations for granted. "Hair," a musical with lots of nudism was a hit on Broadway. Playboy magazine was sold openly on newsstands. The success of my book ALY was part of that new frankness. It was chosen by Helen Gurley Brown to be featured in the first issue of Cosmopolitan she edited. The reborn Cosmo was the first women's magazine designed for the new American young woman -- liberated and sophisticated -- who wanted to read something more exciting than recipes and dress patterns. ALY was favorably reviewed in Newsweek, where I had worked for years. It made Time magazine's list of bestsellers. I had worked there too. It was syndicated to newspapers all over the country, none of which I had ever worked for. Most surprising of all the reviews was the favorable endorsement that appeared in The Atlantic, then the most staid of magazines, edited and published in Boston. Eventually ALY appeared in five foreign editions, including Japanese. Now it's back again, for a new and wiser generation. It's still fun reading.
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