From the One-Thing Files
“I put my feet up on the desk and start reading. If I get an erection, we prosecute.” Prosecuting counsel Mervyn Griffith-Jones, explaining why he prosecuted Penguin Books for obscenity after it published Lady Chatterley's Lover (Blog Post)
All the gossip about Lady Chatterley’s Lover
Nothing has been sillier, Guy Cuthbertson shows, than the promiscuous afterlife of ‘Lady C,’ as Lawrence called the book
Frances Wilson
Wikipedia about the trial:
He led the prosecution of Penguin Books for publishing Lady Chatterley's Lover in paperback format in the obscenity trial held at the Old Bailey from 20 October to 2 November 1960. The book was prosecuted under the Obscene Publications Act 1959, a private members bill introduced by Roy Jenkins, under which a work was considered in its entirety, and had a defence if it was justified by the public good. He asked jurors not to approach the novel "in any priggish, high-minded, super-correct mid-Victorian manner", but alleged that the novel induced "lustful thoughts in the minds of those who read it", and then asked, "...when you have read it through, would you approve of your young sons, young daughters – because girls can read as well as boys – reading this book? Is it a book that you would have lying around in your own house? Is it a book that you would even wish your wife or your servants to read?" The jury reportedly found this question amusing, and it has been described[by whom?] as the "first nail in the prosecution's coffin". A procession of eminent defence witnesses attested to the worth of the novel, and Penguin Books was acquitted of obscenity on 2 November.