In his introduction to this second volume in a three-volume series (the third is forthcoming), Steve Nicholson explains that the original plan for two books expanded because he had recently gained access to formerly inaccessible documents about stage censorship housed in the Royal Archives at Windsor Castle. This material, combined with the British Library's “fifty thousand or so files on individual plays” (1) also previously unexplored by scholars, adds new richness to the fascinating, humorous, and often maddeningly contorted debates that unfolded behind the scenes en route to official decisions to modify or ban stage plays. Detailed examples give readers a sense of the range and complexity of these documents, and from these Nicholson strives “to identify and articulate sets of rules or consistent practices” of the Lord Chamberlain's Office (3).

Like the first volume, the second is organized both chronologically and thematically: three parts cover the years before, during, and after the all-important war years, and within each are chapters on sexual and political issues. About the complex structure Nicholson notes that “incidents and debates related to individual plays may recur and extend over years and decades” and that “in a world familiar with both the concept of sexual politics and immoral politicians, it goes without saying that these are somewhat spurious divisions” (5–6). Some chapters combine very loosely associated material, such as one titled “‘These Communist Effusions’: Testing Tolerance in Religion and Politics” in which officials discuss not only polemical Workers’ Theater productions in the prewar years but also problematic depictions of the monarchy, Irish historical conflicts, and God, Christ, and the Virgin Mary. Other chapters are more focused, addressing such topics as stage representations of fascism in the prewar years, attitudes toward female nudity during the war itself, and the debates prompted by a 1949 parliamentary bill proposing to end the censorship outright. The unexpected savvy and self-awareness of the government officials revealed here is a highlight. Though we may not admire all their decisions or motives, we must discard the idea that they were ignorant Philistines; the record clearly shows that “no-one realised the anachronism of the system better than those who controlled it” (378).

Nicholson's caveat about organization does not prevent it from causing occasional frustration. Finding concerns over representations of Queen Victoria tucked into the chapter on Communist effusions seems an awkward solution to the understandable question: where else in the book could she be tucked? And as one finally begins to grasp what was unfolding, for example, in Parliament in 1949, one wants to know what happens next, rather than be thrown suddenly back into the details of a 1940 conference. Interestingly, however, these problems suggest the very real challenges facing the scholar who digs through these disparate documents hoping to organize and analyze them in a fruitful way for others. Perhaps they even hint at the challenges facing the lord chamberlain himself: confronted regularly with scripts nearly impossible to compare in any categorical way, he was nevertheless expected by both king and public to respond to them in an identifiably consistent fashion.

A great strength of this book is Nicholson's neutral tone; he tends to focus more on revealing than on evaluating the various arguments made by the lord chamberlain, his readers, stage managers, and foes of the censorship. The bureaucrats often disagree with one another about the potential dangers of a given play and also often recognize in themselves conflicting and nearly irreconcilable responses to plays that are quite similar to one another. How they wrestle with the problems unique to each script makes for gripping drama itself, and Nicholson refreshingly remains in the background, drawing back the curtains and allowing the principal players in this historical narrative to take center stage. Some scholars on this subject mock the practices they discuss (Nicholas de Jongh's [2000] Politics, Prudery, and Perversions leaps to mind), and though it may be enjoyable and satisfying to ridicule a system that time has deemed inadequate and even foolish, a strongly biased narrator steals the spotlight away from the historical details. Sometimes one simply wants some room to judge the story for oneself. Though Nicholson's sense of humor about his subjects and their tangled rationalizations does creep in at times, he graciously allows the documents to speak, and readers to think, for themselves.

Unfortunately, Nicholson's modest presence is ultimately too modest. Rather than following long excerpts from these documents with an explanation of their significance, he often simply moves on to a new play or an entirely new topic. If one seeks a substantial analysis of the interesting material here, one will be disappointed. At the opening of each chapter, a few explanatory paragraphs set up the context for the general issues and specific cases that follow. Some chapters also conclude with brief commentary, but not all do. Additionally, plot summaries of the plays in question often comprise but a single sentence, and, with an incomplete sense of the contents of the scripts, readers may find it difficult at times to understand or judge with great confidence the officials’ deliberations about them.

Yet these limitations are modest ones and indeed cannot be helped, for they arise not from any deficiency in the author's ideas or abilities but only from the complex scope of his project. Though Nicholson might have offered his own views more frequently—and we wish he had, given his singular authority on the subject—he has eminently succeeded in introducing the substantial contents of the archive at Windsor Castle to our collective knowledge about stage censorship, a step that will inform further scholarly analysis. And as we get the sense that even three volumes will barely suffice to look closely at the nuances of these official discussions, it would be unreasonable to expect more details about individual plays; after all, in this project they are by definition secondary rather than primary texts. Thanks to Nicholson's prodigious efforts to organize into any publishable form this remarkable cache of archival materials, we know more than ever about the machinations of the Lord Chamberlain's Office in response to British stage productions in the twentieth century. His work leaves scholars with the ongoing challenge to continue to articulate and refine the insights to be drawn from it all.