Adelina Tattilo (13 November 1928 – 1 February 2007) was an Italian publisher. She is acknowledged to be a pioneer in the Italian erotic magazine publishing sector, who contributed to change the social customs

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

from the second half the 1960s. By launching ''

Playmen ''Playmen'' was an Italian Pornographic magazine, adult entertainment magazine. It was founded in 1967 by a mother of three, Adelina Tattilo, achieving fame as Italy's version of ''Playboy'' magazine. The magazine was published monthly and featu ...

'', Tattilo engaged publishers (like Americans

Hugh Hefner Hugh Marston Hefner (April 9, 1926 – September 27, 2017) was an American magazine publisher. He was the founder and editor-in-chief of ''Playboy'' magazine, a publication with revealing photographs and articles which provoked charges of obsc ...

and Larry Flynt did) in an ideological battle to liberate sexual attitudes and free them from bigotry and false moralisms.

Early life, family and education

Adelina Tattilo was born in

Manfredonia Manfredonia is a town and commune of Apulia, Italy, in the province of Foggia, from which it is northeast by rail. Manfredonia is situated on the coast, facing east, to the south of Monte Gargano, and gives its name to the gulf to the east of i ...

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. She was educated at schools managed by nuns in

Ivrea Ivrea (; pms, Ivrèja ; ; lat, Eporedia) is a town and ''comune'' of the Metropolitan City of Turin in the Piedmont region of northwestern Italy. Situated on the road leading to the Aosta Valley (part of the medieval Via Francigena), it stradd ...

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

Career

In the 1960s, Tattilo launched ''Menelik'', a weekly magazine of erotic

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

s, featuring the character Bernarda. This periodical came to sell up to 100,000 copies each week. In 1965 Tattilio and her husband Saro Balsamo broke into publishing with a weekly magazine, ''Big'', for teenage boys which answered questions of curiosity about sex. ''Big'' reached sales approaching 400,000 per week. A year later they started ''Men'', a weekly collection of photographs of nude women purchased from

Scandinavia Scandinavia; Sámi languages: /. ( ) is a subregion#Europe, subregion in Northern Europe, with strong historical, cultural, and linguistic ties between its constituent peoples. In English usage, ''Scandinavia'' most commonly refers to Denmark, ...

or provided by Italian modeling agents. ''

'' was founded in 1967, and looked similar to the American periodical ''

Playboy ''Playboy'' is an American men's lifestyle and entertainment magazine, formerly in print and currently online. It was founded in Chicago in 1953, by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. K ...

'', which was then banned in Italy. Tattilio reported that ''Playmen'' cost US$640,000 to launch, in 1967, and it had risen to an estimated net worth of US$1,600,000 in as soon as 1971. Tattilo made the decisions at ''Playmen'', including cover girl choices and took risks such as publishing covert

paparazzi Paparazzi (, ; ; singular: masculine paparazzo or feminine paparazza) are independent photographers who take pictures of high-profile people; such as actors, musicians, athletes, politicians, and other celebrities, typically while subjects ...

pictures of

Brigitte Bardot Brigitte Anne-Marie Bardot ( ; ; born 28 September 1934), often referred to by her initials B.B., is a former French actress, singer and model. Famous for portraying sexually emancipated characters with hedonistic lifestyles, she was one of the ...

sunbathing topless, and of

Jackie Kennedy Onassis Jacqueline Lee Kennedy Onassis ( ; July 28, 1929 – May 19, 1994) was an American socialite, writer, photographer, and book editor who served as first lady of the United States from 1961 to 1963, as the wife of President John F. Kennedy. A po ...

swimming nude. In the 1960s and 1970s, Adelina Tattilo fought for a libertarian, radical and socialist view in Italy and cultivated a friendship with

Bettino Craxi Benedetto "Bettino" Craxi ( , , ; 24 February 1934 – 19 January 2000) was an Italian politician, leader of the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) from 1976 to 1993, and the 45th prime minister of Italy from 1983 to 1987. He was the first PSI membe ...

. In the early 1970s, Tattilo's publishing house introduced on the market with a series of books including ''Dizionario della Letteratura Erotica'' (''Dictionary of Erotic Literature''), ''La Marijuana Fa Bene'' (''Marijuana Does You Good''), and ''Playdux'' (1973), an erotic history of

fascism Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy an ...

Personal life

Tattilo married Saro Balsamo. They worked together. Later, however, then separated. Tattilo had three children. She died in Rome, February 1, 2007, after a brief illness at the age of 78.

References

External links

Adelina Tattilo Obituary
repubblica.it {{DEFAULTSORT:Tattilo, Adelina 1929 births 2007 deaths Italian magazine editors Italian women editors Italian magazine founders Adult magazine publishers (people) Italian pornographers Women magazine editors 20th-century Italian women writers