Gentlemen of Leisure

by Susan Hall, Bob Adelman (Photography)

Every city-dweller has seen them, ever city-dweller could list the telltale signs: the fur, the gold, the hats, the cars. They are the original macks, the original players. They are Big City pimps—the heroes of gangsta rap. Bob Adelman and Susan Hall dive headlong into their world in the classic investigative docudrama Gentleman of Leisure: A Year in the Life of a Pimp, an in-depth exploration of the underworld figures that populate our streets at night. The first book of its kind, Gentleman of Leisure, originally published in 1972 and now reproduced in a facsimile edition, is a collection of photographs and interviews dramatically documenting the private life of a pimp and his prostitutes. The people who appear in this book are not models: they are real people with real lives. Only their names have been changed to protect the "guilty." Their stories are real. Armed only with a camera and a tape recorder, Adelman and Hall entered the lives of the pimp Silky and his women. What they found flew in the face of prevailing prejudices; stripped of stereotype and myth, the pimps and whores that shared their tales were complex people embroiled in romantic dramas, with a code of behavior as intricate as the Mafia's, and a defined sense of self. This stunning exposé of Silky and his ladies, Lois, Linda, Kitty, Tracey, and Sandy, explains the passionate bond between a pimp and his "ho's"; why shrewd, street-smart working girls find glamour in their lives and choose to give all their money to their pimp; and why they stay with him through incarcerations, despite their jealousies, the burden of their work, and occasional beatings. You learn how a square girl is "turned out" to be a ho and a pimp's "wife." You visit the pimp's tailor and see the source of his fly applejack hats and his mink coats; the tools of his game. You spend evenings at family parties: one man and his many wives. You learn from his wives how this pimp commands such passionate devotion, and arouses jealousy and rebellion in the girls. He explains his game. This is a true story. The secret, intimate, and private world of a pimp and his whores is revealed, cinema verité-style, in Gentleman of Leisure.

Genres: Sexuality

213 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

Reviews

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is such a thing as Battered Woman Syndrome which, I believe, is a sub-category of PTSD.

Now imagine it’s late on a freezing cold night in January, somewhere in New York City. A line of prostitutes are standing along a sidewalk in the yellowish light of a street lamp. One of them is thinking these thoughts: “I wish a trick would come along soon. It’s freezing out here, but what else can I do? My pimp will give me hell if I don’t bring him some money tonight. I’m so sick of this life. Maybe I should just take what little cash I earned tonight, go down to Port Authority, and take the next bus out of here. It wouldn’t matter. He’d find me anywhere. He knows where my family lives, even said he’d kill them if I ever left. I wouldn’t mind working for him so much if he would spend more time with me the way he used to. He used to be so much fun. He’d take me out and we’d have the greatest time of my life, but now he spends most of his time with his other girls, the bitches. He bought them all diamond rings for Christmas and what did he give me? Just a lousy silver ring and a pair of cheap high heels that broke after two nights of streetwalking. He’s been vicious lately too, all that money we give him going up his nose. Then the last time I tried to quit this life, he beat me. Just when I felt so alone and so in need of love, he stopped hitting me and in such a sweet, soft voice he said he loves me and wants to be with me forever. He said he’ll change and treat me better from now on. How could I say no? No one else was there for me. Besides, he says if I turn tricks for one more year he’ll have saved enough money to buy me a beauty salon of my own and I can quit this shitty life for good. Just one more year...”

I bring up Battered Woman Syndrome because all the prostitutes in Gentleman of Leisure: A Year In the Life Of a Pimp display symptoms of this mental disorder. Symptoms include believing that they did something to deserve repeated physical, psychological, or sexual abuse, fear for the safety of themselves or loved ones, disassociation from their own bodies, irrational fear that their abuser is omnipotent or omnipresent, as well as the idea that things will get better if they only wait a little while longer. Repeated blows to the head can cause brain injuries that lead to confused thinking and poor judgment. The abuser in these situations uses methods of manipulation and coercion, control over finances, control over sexual behavior, physical violence, alternating patterns of abuse and tenderness, and promises of a brighter future to keep their victims on a leash, figuratively speaking. Pimps learn these coercion techniques from other pimps. Prostitutes who are enslaved by them often suffer from Stockholm Syndrome. This is what goes on in this unique book.

Gentleman of Leisure started as a photo-journalism project by Bob Adelson, the acclaimed photographer of the Civil Rights Movement. It turned into a literary project as well when the subject pimp, named Silky, and his stable of hookers agreed to be interviewed about their lives. They were surprisingly candid to the point where it is hard to believe this isn’t fiction.

Silky is a sweet-talking, charismatic guy who wears flashy clothes and drives a custom-made car. If you’ve ever seen Blaxploitation movies from the 1970s, you would recognize his kind. On the surface, he seems like a great person to be around, but after getting to know him a bit you realize he is nothing but a predator. He says he prefers pimping white women because Black women are harder to control, but he also admits he has a chip on his shoulder because of slavery and feels that by enslaving white women he is paying society back. And he seems to have almost absolute control over his girls.

But Silky does not do most of the talking throughout the book. We learn more about him through the monologues of the prostitutes who work for him. All of them feel like they are in a committed relationship with him. Sandy is the one he has the most intimate conversations with, Kitty is the one he has the most sex with, Linda is the one he takes out on dates the most. He claims he loves Linda the most, although he beats her when she doesn’t “behave”. Actually, all of them get beaten but Silky says he regrets having to do that. He also makes sure his string of ladies are all jealous of each other in order to keep them from working together against him. They refer to each other as wives-in-law, tolerating the others because their sense of self-worth is low and they depend on Silky because they think they can not live without his protection. You really get a sense of how sick Silky is in a passage where he babysits Kitty’s three year old daughter and begins grooming her for “the lifestyle”.

The author, Linda Hall, and the photographer, Bob Adelman, do not offer any commentary of their own. Their presence in the book is largely unnoticeable. They let their subjects speak for themselves. It isn’t hard to interpret what they say. Silky, whose thoughts are oblivious to anyone’s feelings but his own, is a narcissistic abuser while the women he controls relay anecdotes about living a life they hate. This is matched and contrasted with photographs that show Silky with each woman, sometimes having fun, sometimes being romantic, and sometimes with bruises and lumps on their faces after a beating. This is a book that shows without telling. Some people might criticize Hall and Adelson for not explicitly stating a moral stance, but such pedantry would only diminish and ruin the harsh impact that this book is apparently meant to have.

Gentleman of Leisure is a wretched book about a side of life that most people would feel more comfortable ignoring. Don’t take the easy way out. It lays out everything for you to see like the exposed guts of a freshly slaughtered cow. It’s a book that invites you in to peep like a voyeur at a lifestyle you ordinarily would ignore and then socks you in the gut to show you how terrible these women’s live are. If you go away from this book without feeling some sense of disgust, sadness, sorrow, pity, or depression, you’re probably emotionally dead, mostly likely suffering from some form of psychopathy, the inability to feel empathy for other human beings.

[Jeremy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book presents first-person accounts of a year in the life of a pimp ("Silky") and his stable of prostitutes in New York in the early 1970s. Read it to confirm that it was pretty much like you thought it was. Worth the third star because of the pictures.

[Damika · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't know what my fascination with "the life" is, but this was a good read. It showed a real, human side to the players in the game.

[Will Jeffries · Rating 4 out of 5]

funny as hell

[Christopher Roth · Rating 3 out of 5]

In literary terms, he's no Iceberg Slim, but if I was a workin' girl I'd rather be in Silky's stable than Slim's.

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty interesting as a sociological document but the attitudes are fairly horrific. Great photos of Silky and his stable. Reads like an urban soap opera.

[Jerry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Pimping in some circles is known as The World's Oldest Profession. This book gives a everyday pictorial view of "The Life."

[Michael Burnam-Fink · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pimping ain't easy, and if you ever need to cite a source for that, Gentleman of Leisure is a great one. This book is about Silky, master pimp, and his stable of whores: Sandy, Kitty, Linda, Tracey, and Lois. It describes in their own words why they choose this life, what it means to them, and how they manage the complexities of working on the street.

Getting into this, I wasn't sure exactly what pimping entailed (aside from the commercial stuff), but the book does a great job depicting how Silky cajoles his ladies into focusing their lives on him, working long and unpleasant hours and handing over all their money for even a slice of Silky's life. It's grotesque, toxic, and fascinating. This isn't the life for people who are all there, emotionally speaking.

What really makes this book stand out (and why I bought it) is the photography; stunning posed and candid photos of some damn fly people looking their best in the funkiest decade of fashion. Hate the people, love the style.

[Cchelles · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the fact that the girls got to tell some of their feelings on the subject and how they got in the life. I also liked the photos. It could have been a little better but it was interesting.

[Serap Bozkurt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book about pimps