Victorian vinegar Valentines: Why send me such detested stuff?

February 14, 2019 1:48 PM

If you're sick of the simpering sweetness of this supposed saint's day (Catholic.com), you might enjoy some Victorian vinegar Valentines, as recounted by Atlas Obscura, with more from Collector's Weekly (previously). If you want to copy some salty prose or rather precise, personal poetry, The Satirical Valentine Writer (circa 18xx, via Archive.org) could be your new friend, itself a response to the earlier Valentine Writers, such as Richardson's New London Fashionable Gentlemen's Valentine Writer or, the Lover's Own Book (1828, Archive.org) and the new and improved Sentimental Valentine Writer, containing a selection of the best and newest Valentine Poetry (1850, Archive.org).

See also: Valentines Suffragette postcards, as described in American Woman Suffrage Postcards (Google books preview), and also recounted by the Woman Suffrage Memorabilia website.

posted by filthy light thief (5 comments total)

Coincidentally, a co-worker of mine just wrote a library blog post about vinegar Valentines: Love Stinks and So Do You: Victorian Valentines Most Vile.
posted by The Card Cheat at 2:08 PM on February 14, 2019 [2 favorites]

Roses are red.
Violets are blue.
Fuck you.

Happy Valentines' Mefites everywhere!
posted by Naberius at 2:23 PM on February 14, 2019 [3 favorites]

The Pro-Women's Rights link to a page on the League of Women Voters website is broken but I found a copy of it on archive.org. Also Ms. Magazine reprinted the article and the seven cards.
posted by larrybob at 2:32 PM on February 14, 2019 [3 favorites]

Roses are sometimes red
Violets are frequently violet
Valentine's Day is for marketing
But Scotch leaves me smile-lit
posted by It's Raining Florence Henderson at 2:49 PM on February 14, 2019

Loved a friend's Valentine's Day poem

Roses Are Red
Captain Cook Was A Warning
We're Beheading Colonisers
To Stop Global Warming
posted by AnhydrousLove at 2:58 AM on February 15, 2019 [1 favorite]