Male Prostitution/Social Attitudes in London and Nagano 1901-2
I figured that whilst you're all staying so helpful, I'd throw out queries I have about some of my other fiction projects. This is concerning a novel set over the course of three years in three different countries: London, England 1901, Nagano, Japan 1902 and Paris, France 1903. Character A is a seventeen-year-old male prostitute working and living
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- he keeps the extra money in several places so it just looks like tips; sewed into clothing linings, e.g. coats sleeves, mostly. The money doesn't add up to a degree that looks suspicious until it's all found and placed together: otherwise, it merely appears to be petty change that's his own from his pay or from pawning small gifts from customers.
- he's desperate, really desperate, to save enough money to get out of the brothel and believes himself to be far smarter than the madame (he obviously underestimates her). He's not there by choice - he actually believes he has a genuine debt to pay back to her (she paid his prison bail earlier on, when she first recruited him) but eventually realises that he's long since paid it back and that she doesn't intend for him to be able to leave, gets angry and gets stupid.
- the keepers set the rates, but outside of the brothel he starts approaching men who aren't aware he's attached to a brothel and going somewhere with them on an independent basis - something that's fairly risky, but as I've said, he's not concentrating. The madame never sees them and so it takes her a month or so to cotton on.
A paying the brothel for board, clothes and food sounds perfect. In this case, he'd also pay a percentage each week to paying back the bail debt. So maybe he keeps £1 or less a week for himself on average? And then, if I decide the average number of customers he has a week I can divide by that and figure out a going rate? (Maths is not my strong point, can you tell?)
(Again, thank you so much for replying. The information is really useful!)
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