Editing Double entendre (section)

=== Stage performances ===
[[File:Wilhelm Maria Hubertus Leibl 010.jpg|thumb|right|Flax on a distaff]]
Shakespeare frequently used double entendres in his plays. [[Sir Toby Belch]] in ''[[Twelfth Night]]'' says of [[Sir Andrew Aguecheek|Sir Andrew's]] hair, that "it hangs like [[flax]] on a [[distaff]]; and I hope to see a housewife take thee between her legs and spin it off"; [[Nurse (Romeo and Juliet)|the Nurse]] in ''[[Romeo and Juliet]]'' says that her husband had told [[Juliet]] when she was learning to walk that "Yea, dost thou fall upon thy face? Thou wilt fall backward when thou hast more wit;" or is told the time by [[Mercutio]]: "for the bawdy hand of the dial is now upon the [[Prick (slang)|prick]] of noon;" and in ''[[Hamlet]]'', [[Prince Hamlet|Hamlet]] publicly torments [[Ophelia (character)|Ophelia]] with a series of sexual puns, including "country matters" (similar to "[[cunt]]"). The title of Shakespeare's play ''[[Much Ado About Nothing]]'' is a pun on the Elizabethan use of "no-thing" as slang for [[vagina]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Williams |first=Gordon |year=1997 |title=''A Glossary of Shakespeare's Sexual Language'' |publisher=Althone Press  |isbn= 0-485-12130-1 |page=219}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/booknews/8313901/Title-Deed-How-the-Book-Got-its-Name.html | location=London | work=The Daily Telegraph | first=Gary | last=Dexter | title=Title Deed: How the Book Got its Name | date=13 February 2011 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130917011921/http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/booknews/8313901/Title-Deed-How-the-Book-Got-its-Name.html | archive-date=17 September 2013 }}</ref>

In the UK, starting in the 19th century, [[Victorian morality]] disallowed sexual innuendo in the theatre as being unpleasant, particularly for the ladies in the audience. In [[music hall]] songs, on the other hand, this kind of innuendo remained very popular. [[Marie Lloyd]]'s song "She Sits Among the Cabbages and Peas" is an example of this. In the early 20th century restrictions were placed on lewdness in performances, including some prosecutions. It was the job of the [[Lord Chamberlain]] to examine the scripts of all plays for indecency. Nevertheless, some comedians still continued to get away with it. [[Max Miller (comedian)|Max Miller]] had two books of jokes, a white book and a blue book, and would ask his audience which book they wanted to hear stories from. If they chose the blue book, he could blame the audience for the lewdness to follow (in the UK, "blue" [[Colloquialism|colloquially]] refers to sexual content, as in "blue jokes," "blue movies" etc.).