YNOT – Edge Interactive Publishing Inc., in association with Schiffer Publishing, has published Burlesque Exotic Dancers of the 50s & 60s, a celebration the dancers, costumes and history of the art.
Authored by Judson Rosebush, a New York City-based director and producer of multimedia and computer animation projects, the book features 200 burlesque queens and belly dancing stars from the 1950s and 1960s in publicity shots the dancers handed out to booking agents, managers, theaters, press and fans. Presented are celebrity dancers like Crystal Blue, Toni Rose (the Glow Girl), Bella Dona, Marlo Brando, Sunny Day (the Butterfly Goddess), Dixie Evans (the Marilyn Monroe of Burlesque), Lala Jazir and Dusty Summers (Las Vegas’ only nude magician).
“I like making books,” Rosebush said of his decision to release the printed volume. “I like the permanence of them. I like their tangible nature. I like the way we can bring a body of work together into a coherent whole. And yes, it is a way to leverage [existing] content into new venues.”
Leveraging of content is particularly valuable to adult business owners, Rosebush said. Webmasters who own significant amounts of original material, like Rosebush does, seldom consider worthwhile a medium as old-fashioned as printed matter, but for some content, books seem an especially appropriate milieu. Even better, he noted, the less common the medium, the more likely existing content will attract a new audience.
“Books can provide a venue for repurposing content, but they are also a different vehicle than the internet website,” Rosebush said. “Content matters much more and is much more concentrated. Oftentimes a website is about putting up every picture from a shoot in sequence — and there is nothing wrong with that — but a book is by nature much more selective and much more calibrated.
“I suspect that one of the first rules about repurposing material from the web to a book is finding a concept,” he added. “Many websites are very repetitious — the same formula over and over again. A book needs variety, and it needs words and ideas.”
Burlesque Exotic Dancers of the 50s & 60s is available at Amazon.com or directly from Shiffer Books. Rosebush may be contacted by email.
