MASOCHISM: An Interpretation of Coldness & Cruelty

by Gilles Deleuze ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 27, 1971

This is a bipartite work by a professor at the University of Paris designed primarily to show that sado-masochism is a portmanteau term, that masochism has been considered only as an adjunct to sadism and that, accordingly, Leopold yon Sacher-Masoch has been totally neglected. (Indeed he has no entry in the Britannica.) Accordingly Deleuze analyzes and psychoanalyzes Sacher-Masoch's novel, Venus in Furs, which appears in a new translation as the second half of this book, differentiating its language, use of descriptions, artistic as well as psychoanalytical basis (Freud and Reik, primarily, qualified and repudiated) in terms of what it reveals re the pleasure-pain principle and its derivation, the death instinct, desexualization, etc. All of this is turbid and ""Beneath the sound and fury of sadism and masochism the terrible force of repetition is at work."" It is at work here (cf. page 98 -- ere the same statement is made twice in almost the same words). The novel itself, for which Deleuze makes the exalted claim of being ""exalted,"" is a strange residual of ""pornology"" (i.e. more artistic than pornography) -- a story of silvery, shivering, suffering immolation of the man with ""the eyes of a martyr"" before his Venus in her ""northern"" and ""despotic"" furs and velvet slippers. Another of Deleuze's claims for the novel is its ""frozen suspense"" as Wanda (his wife assumed her name in real life) appears in ""The supple furs (which) greedily caressed her cold marble body."" On the basis of either the explication de texte or the original, it is difficult to reinstate Sacher-Masoch although the work may have a certain professional curiosity.

Pub Date: May 27, 1971

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Braziller

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1971

Categories: NONFICTION