 "Loves
of a Girl Wrestler"
by Ben West
Uni Book #32 195?
The back cover reads: "Lovely Amazons--or
Female Monsters?
Are wrestling girls merely freaks, or do they know the same warm desires
and emotions as other women? How does it feel to be exhibited night after
night, clad only in tights, before audiences loose-lipped with bestial,
lustful hungers?...Or does she become brutalized, morally impoverished,
sapped of all womanly decency from the sordid exhibitions in which she
takes part?
These are some of the questions answered in
this daringly realistic novel!
Here is the colorful wrestling world of today, as seen through the
eyes of a pretty dancer, Rhea Tucker, who in a moment of desperation becomes
a girl gladiator. And here is touching drama excitingly unfolded, as Rhea
desperately fights for ring success--and the heart of the man she cherishes."
Female wrestlers are one of the many archetypal
professions/fetishes that pop up frequently in tawdry and sleaze novels.
Although the girl grappler is rarer than, say, nurses or secretaries, it
still fills an important place in pulp literature. These are classic roles
which have been ingrained into the American psyche. It's like old-time
westerns when you know the good guy wears a white hat and the bad guy wears
black and those classic designations are fine with you. A book like "Loves
Of A Girl Wrestler" plays off of set gender stereotypes--stereotypes
the reader was probably looking for when they skimmed the back cover. In
this book, you get a wonderful juxtaposition of a soft, lovely woman doing
hard, sweaty job. The switch of gender roles (as well as lesbian overtones)
are classic erotic elements, but since this is only a pulp novel, the book
only hints at the sexuality. It would be the job of the sleaze novel, which
would come a decade or so later, to give you all the body slams (both in
on out of the ring) in graphic detail.
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