Beggars, outcasts, urchins, waifs, prostitutes, criminals, convicts,
madmen, fallen women, lunatics, degenerates--part reality, part fantasy,
these are the grotesque faces that populate the underworld, the dark
inverse of our everyday world. Lurking in the mirror that we hold up to
our society, they are our counterparts and our doubles, repelling us and
yet offering the tantalizing promise of escape. Although these images
testify to undeniable social realities, the sordid lower depths make up
a symbolic and social imaginary that reflects our fears and
anxieties--as well as our desires.
In Vice, Crime, and Poverty, Dominique Kalifa traces the untold
history of the concept of the underworld and its representations in
popular culture. He examines how the myth of the lower depths came into
being in nineteenth-century Europe, as biblical figures and Christian
traditions were adapted for a world turned upside-down by the era of
industrialization, democratization, and mass culture. From the Parisian
demimonde to Victorian squalor, from the slums of New York to the sewers
of Buenos Aires, Kalifa deciphers the making of an image that has cast
an enduring spell on its audience. While the social conditions that
created that underworld have changed, Vice, Crime, and Poverty shows
that, from social-scientific ideas of the underclass to contemporary
cinema and steampunk culture, its shadows continue to haunt us.