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Masochism: Coldness and Cruelty & Venus in Furs
In his stunning essay, Coldness and Cruelty, Gilles Deleuze provides a rigorous and informed philosophical examination of the work of the late 19th-century German novelist Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. Deleuze's essay, certainly the most profound study yet produced on the relations between sadism and masochism, seeks to develop and explain Masoch's "peculiar way of 'desexualizing' love while at the same time sexualizing the entire history of humanity." He shows that masochism is something far more subtle and complex than the enjoyment of pain, that masochism has nothing to do with sadism; their worlds do not communicate, just as the genius of those who created them - Masoch and Sade - lie stylistically, philosophically, and politically poles a part. Venus in Furs, the most famous of all of Masoch's novels was written in 1870 and belongs to an unfinished cycle of works that Masoch entitled The Heritage of Cain. The cycle was to treat a series of themes including love, war, and death. The present work is about love. Although the entire constellation of symbols that has come to characterize the masochistic syndrome can be found here - fetishes, whips, disguises, fur-clad women, contracts, humiliations, punishment, and always the volatile presence of a terrible coldness - these do not eclipse the singular power of Masoch's eroticism.
296 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1967
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About the author
Gilles Deleuze
243books2,423followersDeleuze is a key figure in poststructuralist French philosophy. Considering himself an empiricist and a vitalist, his body of work, which rests upon concepts such as multiplicity, constructivism, difference and desire, stands at a substantial remove from the main traditions of 20th century Continental thought. His thought locates him as an influential figure in present-day considerations of society, creativity and subjectivity. Notably, within his metaphysics he favored a Spinozian concept of a plane of immanence with everything a mode of one substance, and thus on the same level of existence. He argued, then, that there is no good and evil, but rather only relationships which are beneficial or harmful to the particular individuals. This ethics influences his approach to society and politics, especially as he was so politically active in struggles for rights and freedoms. Later in his career he wrote some of the more infamous texts of the period, in particular, Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus. These texts are collaborative works with the radical psychoanalyst Félix Guattari, and they exhibit Deleuze’s social and political commitment.
Gilles Deleuze began his career with a number of idiosyncratic yet rigorous historical studies of figures outside of the Continental tradition in vogue at the time. His first book, Empirisism and Subjectivity, is a study of Hume, interpreted by Deleuze to be a radical subjectivist. Deleuze became known for writing about other philosophers with new insights and different readings, interested as he was in liberating philosophical history from the hegemony of one perspective. He wrote on Spinoza, Nietzche, Kant, Leibniz and others, including literary authors and works, cinema, and art. Deleuze claimed that he did not write “about� art, literature, or cinema, but, rather, undertook philosophical “encounters� that led him to new concepts. As a constructivist, he was adamant that philosophers are creators, and that each reading of philosophy, or each philosophical encounter, ought to inspire new concepts. Additionally, according to Deleuze and his concepts of difference, there is no identity, and in repetition, nothing is ever the same. Rather, there is only difference: copies are something new, everything is constantly changing, and reality is a becoming, not a being.
He often collaborated with philosophers and artists as Félix Guattari, Michel Foucault, Guy Hocquenghem, René Schérer, Carmelo Bene, François Châtelet, Olivier Revault d'Allonnes, Jean-François Lyotard, Georges Lapassade, Kateb Yacine and many others.
Gilles Deleuze began his career with a number of idiosyncratic yet rigorous historical studies of figures outside of the Continental tradition in vogue at the time. His first book, Empirisism and Subjectivity, is a study of Hume, interpreted by Deleuze to be a radical subjectivist. Deleuze became known for writing about other philosophers with new insights and different readings, interested as he was in liberating philosophical history from the hegemony of one perspective. He wrote on Spinoza, Nietzche, Kant, Leibniz and others, including literary authors and works, cinema, and art. Deleuze claimed that he did not write “about� art, literature, or cinema, but, rather, undertook philosophical “encounters� that led him to new concepts. As a constructivist, he was adamant that philosophers are creators, and that each reading of philosophy, or each philosophical encounter, ought to inspire new concepts. Additionally, according to Deleuze and his concepts of difference, there is no identity, and in repetition, nothing is ever the same. Rather, there is only difference: copies are something new, everything is constantly changing, and reality is a becoming, not a being.
He often collaborated with philosophers and artists as Félix Guattari, Michel Foucault, Guy Hocquenghem, René Schérer, Carmelo Bene, François Châtelet, Olivier Revault d'Allonnes, Jean-François Lyotard, Georges Lapassade, Kateb Yacine and many others.
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November 25, 2016
دوستان� گرانقدر، این کتاب همانطور که از عنوانش پیداست، به موضوعِ <مازوخیسم> و یا <مازوشیسم> پرداخته است
عزیزانم� <مازوشیسم> و یا همان <شهوتِ خودآزاری>، نوعی از [آزار دوستی] است و اصل این واژه بر گرفته از نامِ <لئوپولد ساچر مازوخ> نویسندهٔ آلمانی-اتریشی، میباشد که در قرنِ نوزدهم میزیست و در آثار و نوشته هایش زنانی را توصیف میکرد که در هنگامِ سکس و آمیزش جنسی، خواهانِ خشونت و آزار دیدن بودند
همانطو� که میدانید سادیست ها از آزار رساندن لذت میبرند، ولی مازوشیست ها از آزار دیدن لذت میبرند
ا� دیدگاهِ <ادوارد گلوورد> مازوشیست ها همان کسانی هستند که از کودکی مبتلا به سادیست بودند ولی از آنجایی که دچار محدودیت هایِ طبیعی و اجتماعی بوده اند، نتوانستند فرصتِ چندانی برایِ ارضا <سادیسم> خویش پیدا کنند، لذا <سادیسم> را از خارج به داخل آورده و تبدیل به <مازوشیسم> میکنند... پس نتیجه میگیریم که <سادیسم> هرگاه به مانعی برخورد کند و بازگردد، سببِ تقویتِ <مازوشیسم> میگردد... به همین دلیل است که <فروید> نیز اعلام کرد که <سادیسم> و <مازوشیسم> از تجلیاتِ "سائقهٔ مرگ" و یا تخریبند... <فروید> معتقد بود که کسانی که درد را امری لازم و طبیعی برایِ انسان میدانند، مسلماً از <مازوشیسم> و بطور کلی از <سادیسم> رنج میبرند... مانندِ دینکاران و کشیشانِ مذهبی که مانع از این میشدند که پزشکان در عملِ جراحی بیماران را به وسیلهٔ دارو و یا هیپنوتیسم، بیهوش کنند
د� حال حاضر نیز برخی از مسلمانها و حتی برخی از بودائیان به امید درکِ فنا و نیستی و یا بیدردی محض، از انواعِ سختی ها و بلاهایِ هلاک کننده، به صورتِ کاملاً بیخردانه استقبال میکنند و حتی اگر در این راه کسی هلاک شود، او را شهید راه خدا قلمداد میکنند
عزیزانم� در آثارِ ادبی و اشعارِ سرزمینمان بارها به موضوعِ <خودآزاری> اشاره شده است که برخی از آنها را در زیر به انتخاب، برایتان مینویسم
------------------------------------------------
سعد� میگوید
داروی� عشاق چیست؟ زهر زِ دستِ نگار
مرهم� عشاق چیست؟ زخم زِ بازویِ دوست
---------�--------------------------------------
عطا� میگوید
هرک� را خوش نیست دل در درد تو
خو� مبادش، زانکه نیست او مرد تو
ذر� ای دردم ده ای درمان من
زانک� بی دردت بمیرد جان من
------------------------------------------------
عاش� اصفهانی میگوید
چنا� به زخمِ ستم مایل است مرغِ دلم
ک� بسمل است و نگاهش بدستِ صیاد است
------------------------------------------------
هلال� جغتایی میگوید
د� علاجِ دردِ من کوشش مفرما ای طبیب
زانک� هر دردی که از عشق است، درمانِ منست
------------------------------------------------
بها� شیروانی میگوید
خ� کرده دردم، بِکش دست ای طبیب از چاره ام
گ� میتوانی سعی کن، افزون شود بیماریم
------------------------------------------------
مولان� میگوید
ا� دوست به یادگار، دردی دارم
کا� درد به صدهزار درمان ندهم
------------------------------------------------
مشتا� اصفهانی میگوید
کودک� مکتبِ عشقم، بجفا خوش دارد
ه� گزاندیشه کی از سیلی استاد کنم
------------------------------------------------
امیدوار� این ریویو برای شما دوستانِ خردگرا، مفید بوده باشه
�<پیروز باشید و ایرانی>
عزیزانم� <مازوشیسم> و یا همان <شهوتِ خودآزاری>، نوعی از [آزار دوستی] است و اصل این واژه بر گرفته از نامِ <لئوپولد ساچر مازوخ> نویسندهٔ آلمانی-اتریشی، میباشد که در قرنِ نوزدهم میزیست و در آثار و نوشته هایش زنانی را توصیف میکرد که در هنگامِ سکس و آمیزش جنسی، خواهانِ خشونت و آزار دیدن بودند
همانطو� که میدانید سادیست ها از آزار رساندن لذت میبرند، ولی مازوشیست ها از آزار دیدن لذت میبرند
ا� دیدگاهِ <ادوارد گلوورد> مازوشیست ها همان کسانی هستند که از کودکی مبتلا به سادیست بودند ولی از آنجایی که دچار محدودیت هایِ طبیعی و اجتماعی بوده اند، نتوانستند فرصتِ چندانی برایِ ارضا <سادیسم> خویش پیدا کنند، لذا <سادیسم> را از خارج به داخل آورده و تبدیل به <مازوشیسم> میکنند... پس نتیجه میگیریم که <سادیسم> هرگاه به مانعی برخورد کند و بازگردد، سببِ تقویتِ <مازوشیسم> میگردد... به همین دلیل است که <فروید> نیز اعلام کرد که <سادیسم> و <مازوشیسم> از تجلیاتِ "سائقهٔ مرگ" و یا تخریبند... <فروید> معتقد بود که کسانی که درد را امری لازم و طبیعی برایِ انسان میدانند، مسلماً از <مازوشیسم> و بطور کلی از <سادیسم> رنج میبرند... مانندِ دینکاران و کشیشانِ مذهبی که مانع از این میشدند که پزشکان در عملِ جراحی بیماران را به وسیلهٔ دارو و یا هیپنوتیسم، بیهوش کنند
د� حال حاضر نیز برخی از مسلمانها و حتی برخی از بودائیان به امید درکِ فنا و نیستی و یا بیدردی محض، از انواعِ سختی ها و بلاهایِ هلاک کننده، به صورتِ کاملاً بیخردانه استقبال میکنند و حتی اگر در این راه کسی هلاک شود، او را شهید راه خدا قلمداد میکنند
عزیزانم� در آثارِ ادبی و اشعارِ سرزمینمان بارها به موضوعِ <خودآزاری> اشاره شده است که برخی از آنها را در زیر به انتخاب، برایتان مینویسم
------------------------------------------------
سعد� میگوید
داروی� عشاق چیست؟ زهر زِ دستِ نگار
مرهم� عشاق چیست؟ زخم زِ بازویِ دوست
---------�--------------------------------------
عطا� میگوید
هرک� را خوش نیست دل در درد تو
خو� مبادش، زانکه نیست او مرد تو
ذر� ای دردم ده ای درمان من
زانک� بی دردت بمیرد جان من
------------------------------------------------
عاش� اصفهانی میگوید
چنا� به زخمِ ستم مایل است مرغِ دلم
ک� بسمل است و نگاهش بدستِ صیاد است
------------------------------------------------
هلال� جغتایی میگوید
د� علاجِ دردِ من کوشش مفرما ای طبیب
زانک� هر دردی که از عشق است، درمانِ منست
------------------------------------------------
بها� شیروانی میگوید
خ� کرده دردم، بِکش دست ای طبیب از چاره ام
گ� میتوانی سعی کن، افزون شود بیماریم
------------------------------------------------
مولان� میگوید
ا� دوست به یادگار، دردی دارم
کا� درد به صدهزار درمان ندهم
------------------------------------------------
مشتا� اصفهانی میگوید
کودک� مکتبِ عشقم، بجفا خوش دارد
ه� گزاندیشه کی از سیلی استاد کنم
------------------------------------------------
امیدوار� این ریویو برای شما دوستانِ خردگرا، مفید بوده باشه
�<پیروز باشید و ایرانی>
April 7, 2017
Aww, I'd forgotten all about this book. Many moons ago, I was going to write my senior thesis on, roughly, "Sadism and Masochism in the Stories of Franz Kafka," with this book as one of my primary sources. I inhaled this book (and several others), wrote about 30 pages, consulted with the ancient visiting Kafka scholar whose class I'd been taking, wrote another dozen pages, then realized I'd rather put out my own eyes than write any more on this vaguely creepy topic.
I did a creative thesis instead. (Looking back, maybe I was kind of a wimp.)
I did a creative thesis instead. (Looking back, maybe I was kind of a wimp.)
May 28, 2014
I never realized masochism and politics go so well together. And this from someone who enjoys watching MSNBC. Deleuze begins his march through this insensitive topic by drawing a distinction between it and sadism through the uses of humor:
"A popular joke tells of the meeting between a sadist and a masochist; the masochist says: 'Hurt me.' The sadist replies: 'No.' This is a particularly stupid joke, not only because it is unrealistic but because it foolishly claims competence to pass judgment on the world of perversions. It is unrealistic because a genuine sadist could never tolerate a masochistic victim. Neither would the masochistic tolerate a truly sadistic torturer."
Reading this I wrote in the margins, "Ha, ha. It looks like ole Gilles is having some fun at the expense of the Left. Oh no, here comes Badiou and Zizek with their pitchforks!" But I wasn't that far off in my facetiousness: Deleuze is making an argument for what perverse behavior and counter-intuitive thinking can tell us about our politics.
How do you explain Kafka and friends overcome with laughter at Kafka's reading of The Trial? How come disciples of Socrates couldn't contain themselves either at the death of their beloved teacher? Or put another way, why do we allow ourselves to be manipulated by the narrative conceits of crappy novelists?
Waiting, disavowal, suspense, fetishism, fantasy aren't isolated, private phenomena. One needs to believe that one is not dreaming, even when one is. Marquis de Sade's Juliette advises two weeks of abstaining from lustful behavior. If you can manage that then lie down and imagine for yourself different wanton acts. One will move you more powerfully than the rest and it will become like an obsession - write it down!!
Sounds like a cheap form of psychoanalysis. But this leads to the penultimate chapter, "Humor, Irony and the Law." In one of his notes Pascal suggests that God is no more than all the mores in a culture as a limit defined by its own law. The wrath of God is no more than the chorus of everyone's disapproval we hear in our own language, which they have yet to address to us directly (thus, nightmares and bad dreams). Plato set up "The Good" as the basis of all law: Christianity followed. Kant subverted this basis, changing it to "The Law" itself: our current human rights regime followed. What is "The Law", really? Who knows, since it's as unknowable as God. We in the West have simply replaced one inscrutable world system for another, even as atheists are convinced they have all the answers. "The Good" is now dependent on "The Law" and Kafka found all this amusing:
"Even guilt and punishment do not tell us what the law is," Deleuze writes, "but leave it in a state of indeterminacy equaled only by the extreme specificity of the punishment. This is the world described by Kafka."
A friend of mine read The Goldfinch recently. She was stopped dead in her tracks by Tartt quoting Nietzsche: "We have art in order not to die from the truth." Looking Nietzsche's line up online she found everyone quoting it and no one interested in its origins. "Radiohead reviewers like to quote it erroneously (too)," she discovered. Unlike Tartt quoting it optimistically the words actually come from a Nietzsche entry labeled Pessimism in Art. This friend, brilliant as ever, describes for us the masochism others receive from novel reading she is unwilling to allow herself, "The increasing delay in the plot: those narrative deferments which deliberate teasings I'll never get used to - just tell them about your dead phone Theo! - and that judder to an halt only when the requisite chapter of wisdom is served." After considering Nietzsche's words ("How liberating is Dostoevsky!") she appends this excellent thought, "No beauty as consolation here."
"A popular joke tells of the meeting between a sadist and a masochist; the masochist says: 'Hurt me.' The sadist replies: 'No.' This is a particularly stupid joke, not only because it is unrealistic but because it foolishly claims competence to pass judgment on the world of perversions. It is unrealistic because a genuine sadist could never tolerate a masochistic victim. Neither would the masochistic tolerate a truly sadistic torturer."
Reading this I wrote in the margins, "Ha, ha. It looks like ole Gilles is having some fun at the expense of the Left. Oh no, here comes Badiou and Zizek with their pitchforks!" But I wasn't that far off in my facetiousness: Deleuze is making an argument for what perverse behavior and counter-intuitive thinking can tell us about our politics.
How do you explain Kafka and friends overcome with laughter at Kafka's reading of The Trial? How come disciples of Socrates couldn't contain themselves either at the death of their beloved teacher? Or put another way, why do we allow ourselves to be manipulated by the narrative conceits of crappy novelists?
Waiting, disavowal, suspense, fetishism, fantasy aren't isolated, private phenomena. One needs to believe that one is not dreaming, even when one is. Marquis de Sade's Juliette advises two weeks of abstaining from lustful behavior. If you can manage that then lie down and imagine for yourself different wanton acts. One will move you more powerfully than the rest and it will become like an obsession - write it down!!
Sounds like a cheap form of psychoanalysis. But this leads to the penultimate chapter, "Humor, Irony and the Law." In one of his notes Pascal suggests that God is no more than all the mores in a culture as a limit defined by its own law. The wrath of God is no more than the chorus of everyone's disapproval we hear in our own language, which they have yet to address to us directly (thus, nightmares and bad dreams). Plato set up "The Good" as the basis of all law: Christianity followed. Kant subverted this basis, changing it to "The Law" itself: our current human rights regime followed. What is "The Law", really? Who knows, since it's as unknowable as God. We in the West have simply replaced one inscrutable world system for another, even as atheists are convinced they have all the answers. "The Good" is now dependent on "The Law" and Kafka found all this amusing:
"Even guilt and punishment do not tell us what the law is," Deleuze writes, "but leave it in a state of indeterminacy equaled only by the extreme specificity of the punishment. This is the world described by Kafka."
A friend of mine read The Goldfinch recently. She was stopped dead in her tracks by Tartt quoting Nietzsche: "We have art in order not to die from the truth." Looking Nietzsche's line up online she found everyone quoting it and no one interested in its origins. "Radiohead reviewers like to quote it erroneously (too)," she discovered. Unlike Tartt quoting it optimistically the words actually come from a Nietzsche entry labeled Pessimism in Art. This friend, brilliant as ever, describes for us the masochism others receive from novel reading she is unwilling to allow herself, "The increasing delay in the plot: those narrative deferments which deliberate teasings I'll never get used to - just tell them about your dead phone Theo! - and that judder to an halt only when the requisite chapter of wisdom is served." After considering Nietzsche's words ("How liberating is Dostoevsky!") she appends this excellent thought, "No beauty as consolation here."
June 3, 2024
Apparently Sacher-Masoch actually did enjoy to “be subjected to punishments, humiliations, and even acute physical pain by an opulent fur-clad woman with a whip� (10). His series, the Heritage of Cain, includes the famous Venus in Furs, and was “intended first to express the burden of crime and suffering inherited by humanity� (12):
Sacher-Masoch is not to be “transposed� with de Sade, with “the instincts reversed,� some sort of bogus “unity of opposites,� an “unfair assumption of complementarity and dialectical unity� (13). Rather, when “we read Masoch we become aware that his universe has nothing to do with that of Sade� (id.). Based on the medical distinction between syndrome and symptom, author proposes that “sado-masochism is a syndrome� (14). In reading the history of medicine, Deleuze notes that “the doctor does not invent the illness, he dissociates symptoms that were previously grouped together, and links up others that were dissociated� (15).
That their names have been used to designate purported diseases (“two basic perversions�) is evidence of “the efficiency of literature� (15) (contrary to Mieville's notion that literature is remarkably inefficient as political propaganda): “Sade and Masoch present unparalleled configurations of symptoms and signs� (16). When he coined masochism, Krafft-Ebing “was giving Masoch credit for having redefined a clinical entity not merely in terms of the link between pain and sexual pleasure, but in terms of something more fundamental connected with bondage and humiliation� (id).
Regarding de Sade:
In de Sade, “the libertine may put on an act of trying to convince and persuade […] but the intention to convince is merely apparent, for nothing is in fact more alien to the sadist than the wish to convince, to persuade, in short to educate. He is interested in something quite different, namely to demonstrate that reasoning itself is a form of violence� (18). In the course of the apparent reasoning, “the acts of violence inflicted on the victims are a mere reflection of a higher form of violence to which the demonstration testifies� (19). Sadism is broken into two components: the ‘personal� (“directs and describes the personal violence of the sadist as well as his individual tastes� (19)) and the ‘impersonal� (a “higher factor […] identifies the impersonal violence with an Idea of pure reason, with a terrible demonstration capable of subordinating the first element� (20)).
Sacher-Masoch has a “similar transcendence of the imperative and the descriptive toward a higher function� (20): “But in this case it is all persuasion and education� (id.). Instead of a victim being tortured by someone “enjoying her all the more because she is unconsenting and unpersuaded,� the masochist is a “victim [sic] in search of a torturer and who needs to educate, persuade, and conclude an alliance with the torturer� (20). Sadism accordingly requires no advertisements; “the masochist draws up contracts while the sadist abominates and destroys them� (id.) (for the masochist, “the contract represents the ideal form of the love-relationship� (75)). The sadist needs “institutions,� by contrast. These two types correspond to the medieval notion of traffic with the devil: “the sadist thinks in terms of institutionalized possession, the masochist in terms of contractual alliance� (20). Also: “While Sade is spinozistic and employs demonstrative reason, Masoch is platonic and proceeds by dialectical imagination� (22).
Whereas de Sade’s provocations are “obscene in themselves,� Sacher-Masoch’s are notable for their “unusual decency� (25). For the masochist, humiliation is a secondary gain; “we never see the naked body of the woman torturer; it is always wrapped in furs. The body of the victim [sic] remains in a strange state of indeterminacy except where it receives the blows� (26). Sadism however is rooted in “negation,� both as a “partial process and pure negation as a totalizing Idea� (id.). The sadist is disappointed in the impossibility of the perfect crime and has “an internal necessity that he evolves the idea of a delusion� (27). The sadists (in the 120 Days) “find excitement not in ‘what is here,� but in ‘what is not here,� the absent Object, ‘the idea of evil’� (28). We might note also “the monotony of sadism,� its repetitiveness (id.).
As to fetishism: for de Sade, it occurs “only in a secondary or distorted sense�; it is “divested of its essential relation to disavowal and suspense and passes into the totally different context of negativity and negation� (32). In Sacher-Masoch, “there can be no masochism without fetishism in the primary sense� (id.): “It is no exaggeration to say that Masoch was the first novelist to make use of suspense as an essential ingredient of romantic fiction� (33). The latter’s “aesthetic and dramatic suspense� vs. the former’s “mechanical, cumulative repetition� (34). This is why Sacher-Masoch has no obscenity: it is suspended (“The whip or the sword that never strikes, the fur that never discloses the flesh, the heel that is forever descending� (70)). For de Sade, “imperatives and descriptions transcend themselves toward the higher function of demonstration�; for Sacher-Masoch, “imperatives and descriptions also achieve a transcendent function, but it is of a mythical and dialectical order. Ergo, “the fundamental distinction between sadism and masochism can be summarized in the contrasting processes of the negative and negation on the one hand, and of disavowal and suspense on the other� (35).
Some suggestion that a certain “excess� is required for eroticism, and in deploying the excess, these writers set up a “counter-language� (37). Dunno. But: no doubt that “a genuine sadist could never tolerate a masochistic victim� (40), and no doubt likewise that “neither would the masochist tolerate a truly sadistic torturer� (41); the former sends away the voluntary, and the latter needs to persuade. These incompatibilities militate against any sort of complementarity:
Chapter on Sacher-Masoch’s express aesthetic doctrine, which he terms “supersensualism,� which describes a “cultural state of transmuted sensuality� wherein “the senses become ‘theoreticians’� (69) (I know, right?). The masochistic ‘hero� is exercised by works of art (“women become exciting when they are indistinguishable [!!!!] from cold statues� (69). We had already read that the women of Sacher-Masoch are “always the same woman� (47) with whip and furs, despite outward appearances—a fungibility that is supergross. But here, even as the masochistic torturers all enter into a zone of indistinction, so too she coincides without remainder with inanimate objects—very much Agamben’s reading of Aristotle’s doctrine of slavery in The Use of Bodies--the masochist ‘uses� the body of the torturer as though it were inanimate. Even so, “masochism is a state of waiting; the masochist experiences waiting in its pure form� (71).
In de Sade, however, the libertines “are not art lovers� (69). Rather, he relies “on quantitative techniques of accumulation and acceleration, mechanically grounded in a materialistic theory� (70). Great little note that equates the masochist with ancient slaves, who were allegedly held via contract (likely true in some cases, such as those held as sponsor, say)—“the masochist appears to be held by real chains, but in fact he is bound by his word alone� (75), which kinda rubbishes the call to arms at the end of the Manifesto of the Communist Party regarding “you have nothing to lose but your chains�; if the proletarians are bound by word alone, who cares about chains? We know from Blake that the salient bonds are words alone:
Some reflections thereafter on Plato, Kant, Kafka, more Freud, &c.
Recommended for those who may be disturbed when Krafft-Ebing used their name to designate a perversion, bearers of the mark of Cain, and readers who appear to be held by real chains but in fact are bound by words alone.
this apparent cruelty conceals the more secret theme of the coldness of Nature, of the steppe, of the icy image of the Mother wherein Cain discovers his own destiny; the coldness of the stern mother is in reality a transmutation of cruelty from which the new man emerges. The ‘mark� of Cain indicates how the ‘heritage� is to be used. Cain and Christ bear the same mark, which leads to the crucifixion of Man ‘who knows no sexual love, no property, no fatherland, no cause, no work.� (12)So, it’s not just about butthole pleasures, and the rusty trombone, and the dirty Sanchez, and the Cincinnati bowtie, and the pussy juice cocktail.
Sacher-Masoch is not to be “transposed� with de Sade, with “the instincts reversed,� some sort of bogus “unity of opposites,� an “unfair assumption of complementarity and dialectical unity� (13). Rather, when “we read Masoch we become aware that his universe has nothing to do with that of Sade� (id.). Based on the medical distinction between syndrome and symptom, author proposes that “sado-masochism is a syndrome� (14). In reading the history of medicine, Deleuze notes that “the doctor does not invent the illness, he dissociates symptoms that were previously grouped together, and links up others that were dissociated� (15).
That their names have been used to designate purported diseases (“two basic perversions�) is evidence of “the efficiency of literature� (15) (contrary to Mieville's notion that literature is remarkably inefficient as political propaganda): “Sade and Masoch present unparalleled configurations of symptoms and signs� (16). When he coined masochism, Krafft-Ebing “was giving Masoch credit for having redefined a clinical entity not merely in terms of the link between pain and sexual pleasure, but in terms of something more fundamental connected with bondage and humiliation� (id).
Regarding de Sade:
In a text that ought to invalidate all theories relating Sade to Nazism, Georges Bataille explains that the language of Sade is paradoxical because it is essentially that of a victim. Only the victim can describe torture; the torturer necessarily uses the hypocritical language of established order and power. ‘As a general rule the torturer does not use the language of violence exerted by him in the name of established authority; he uses the language of authority.� (17)The 120 Days of Sodom “hinges on tales told to the libertines by ‘women chroniclers,� and in principle the heroes [sic] may not take any initiative in anticipation of these tales� (18). In Sacher-Masoch, by contrast, “love affairs are always set in motion by anonymous letters, by the use of pseudonyms or by advertisements in newspapers. They must be regulated by contracts that formalize and verbalize the behavior of the partners� (18); all sex acts must be promised and described prior to their occurrence. Neither of these writers counts as pornography, but are rather “pornology because its erotic language cannot be reduced to the elementary functions of ordering and describing� (18).
In de Sade, “the libertine may put on an act of trying to convince and persuade […] but the intention to convince is merely apparent, for nothing is in fact more alien to the sadist than the wish to convince, to persuade, in short to educate. He is interested in something quite different, namely to demonstrate that reasoning itself is a form of violence� (18). In the course of the apparent reasoning, “the acts of violence inflicted on the victims are a mere reflection of a higher form of violence to which the demonstration testifies� (19). Sadism is broken into two components: the ‘personal� (“directs and describes the personal violence of the sadist as well as his individual tastes� (19)) and the ‘impersonal� (a “higher factor […] identifies the impersonal violence with an Idea of pure reason, with a terrible demonstration capable of subordinating the first element� (20)).
Sacher-Masoch has a “similar transcendence of the imperative and the descriptive toward a higher function� (20): “But in this case it is all persuasion and education� (id.). Instead of a victim being tortured by someone “enjoying her all the more because she is unconsenting and unpersuaded,� the masochist is a “victim [sic] in search of a torturer and who needs to educate, persuade, and conclude an alliance with the torturer� (20). Sadism accordingly requires no advertisements; “the masochist draws up contracts while the sadist abominates and destroys them� (id.) (for the masochist, “the contract represents the ideal form of the love-relationship� (75)). The sadist needs “institutions,� by contrast. These two types correspond to the medieval notion of traffic with the devil: “the sadist thinks in terms of institutionalized possession, the masochist in terms of contractual alliance� (20). Also: “While Sade is spinozistic and employs demonstrative reason, Masoch is platonic and proceeds by dialectical imagination� (22).
Whereas de Sade’s provocations are “obscene in themselves,� Sacher-Masoch’s are notable for their “unusual decency� (25). For the masochist, humiliation is a secondary gain; “we never see the naked body of the woman torturer; it is always wrapped in furs. The body of the victim [sic] remains in a strange state of indeterminacy except where it receives the blows� (26). Sadism however is rooted in “negation,� both as a “partial process and pure negation as a totalizing Idea� (id.). The sadist is disappointed in the impossibility of the perfect crime and has “an internal necessity that he evolves the idea of a delusion� (27). The sadists (in the 120 Days) “find excitement not in ‘what is here,� but in ‘what is not here,� the absent Object, ‘the idea of evil’� (28). We might note also “the monotony of sadism,� its repetitiveness (id.).
As to fetishism: for de Sade, it occurs “only in a secondary or distorted sense�; it is “divested of its essential relation to disavowal and suspense and passes into the totally different context of negativity and negation� (32). In Sacher-Masoch, “there can be no masochism without fetishism in the primary sense� (id.): “It is no exaggeration to say that Masoch was the first novelist to make use of suspense as an essential ingredient of romantic fiction� (33). The latter’s “aesthetic and dramatic suspense� vs. the former’s “mechanical, cumulative repetition� (34). This is why Sacher-Masoch has no obscenity: it is suspended (“The whip or the sword that never strikes, the fur that never discloses the flesh, the heel that is forever descending� (70)). For de Sade, “imperatives and descriptions transcend themselves toward the higher function of demonstration�; for Sacher-Masoch, “imperatives and descriptions also achieve a transcendent function, but it is of a mythical and dialectical order. Ergo, “the fundamental distinction between sadism and masochism can be summarized in the contrasting processes of the negative and negation on the one hand, and of disavowal and suspense on the other� (35).
Some suggestion that a certain “excess� is required for eroticism, and in deploying the excess, these writers set up a “counter-language� (37). Dunno. But: no doubt that “a genuine sadist could never tolerate a masochistic victim� (40), and no doubt likewise that “neither would the masochist tolerate a truly sadistic torturer� (41); the former sends away the voluntary, and the latter needs to persuade. These incompatibilities militate against any sort of complementarity:
The woman torturer of masochism cannot be sadistic precisely because she is in the masochistic situation, she is an integral part of it, a realization of the masochistic fantasy. She belongs in the masochistic world, not in the sense that she has the same tastes as her victim, but because her ‘sadism� is of a kind never found in the sadist; it is as it were the double or the reflection of masochism. The same is true of the sadist. The victim cannot be masochistic, not merely because the libertine would be irked if she were to experience pleasure, but because the victim of the sadist belongs entirely to the world of sadism. (41)Some philistine stuff follows regarding the ‘types� of ‘women� in Sacher-Masoch (47 ff), laden with untenable principles of differentiation (e.g., “as a reaction to man’s [sic] heightened consciousness woman developed sentimentality� (54) eww?). And then after is an even worse chapter on the Freudian implications (57 ff). C’mon already. (It does draw out a contrast: “there is between sadism and masochism an irreducible dissymmetry: sadism stands for the active negation of the mother and the inflation of the father (who is placed above the law [cf. Agamben]); masochism proceeds by a twofold disavowal, a positive, idealizing disavowal of the mother (who is identified with the law) and an invalidating disavowal of the father (who is expelled from the symbolic order)� (68)).
Chapter on Sacher-Masoch’s express aesthetic doctrine, which he terms “supersensualism,� which describes a “cultural state of transmuted sensuality� wherein “the senses become ‘theoreticians’� (69) (I know, right?). The masochistic ‘hero� is exercised by works of art (“women become exciting when they are indistinguishable [!!!!] from cold statues� (69). We had already read that the women of Sacher-Masoch are “always the same woman� (47) with whip and furs, despite outward appearances—a fungibility that is supergross. But here, even as the masochistic torturers all enter into a zone of indistinction, so too she coincides without remainder with inanimate objects—very much Agamben’s reading of Aristotle’s doctrine of slavery in The Use of Bodies--the masochist ‘uses� the body of the torturer as though it were inanimate. Even so, “masochism is a state of waiting; the masochist experiences waiting in its pure form� (71).
In de Sade, however, the libertines “are not art lovers� (69). Rather, he relies “on quantitative techniques of accumulation and acceleration, mechanically grounded in a materialistic theory� (70). Great little note that equates the masochist with ancient slaves, who were allegedly held via contract (likely true in some cases, such as those held as sponsor, say)—“the masochist appears to be held by real chains, but in fact he is bound by his word alone� (75), which kinda rubbishes the call to arms at the end of the Manifesto of the Communist Party regarding “you have nothing to lose but your chains�; if the proletarians are bound by word alone, who cares about chains? We know from Blake that the salient bonds are words alone:
In every cry of every Man,Marx & Engels barking up the wrong tree, then? Mind-forged manacles are basically everywhere; de Sade, recall, “thinks in terms of ‘institutions,� Masoch in terms of ‘the contract’� (76-77). The latter “presupposes in principle the free consent of the contracting parties� whereas the former “determine a long-term state of affairs which is both involuntary and inalienable� (77). Both have political implications. On the one hand, de Sade “rejects any contractual conception of the republican regime and is even more strongly against the idea of the law� (77-78). He preferred “the revolutionary republic as an institution based on opposition to both law and contract,� perhaps presented with some irony, however (78). The politics of Sacher-Masoch are “the humorous converse of Sade� (id.).
In every Infants cry of fear,
In every voice: in every ban,
The mind-forg'd manacles I hear
Some reflections thereafter on Plato, Kant, Kafka, more Freud, &c.
Recommended for those who may be disturbed when Krafft-Ebing used their name to designate a perversion, bearers of the mark of Cain, and readers who appear to be held by real chains but in fact are bound by words alone.
January 13, 2021
finished this and now everything i've ever read feels different. floored. i can barely even articulate what i want to say, it should just be experienced. deleuze's psychoanalysis made me feel like the project was merely overstated heterosexual pageantry until I went through VENUS IN FURS at the end of the volume and suddenly the world revealed itself for a knot of illusion and slavery and desire. "pleasure alone makes life worthwhile; whoever suffers or lives in privation greets death as a friend, but whoever surrenders to pleasure does not easily part with life." the romantic brutality and the power and sex and the human urge to submit to one another appears so clearly in this i'll never be able to unsee it. will probably be relevant to the world's own grave
September 6, 2018
Deleuze uncouples Masochism and Sadism from what he identifies as the “sadomasochistic entity�-- a misdiagnosed fusion of the two, first in Psychopathia Sexualis and later erroneously reinforced by Freud--by arguing that both perversions are different in kind, rather than in degree. Sadism is essentially institutional, anarchic, apathetic, employing the quantitative power of demonstrative reason in an attempt to kill the mother and the ego in service of the superego, while Masochism is aesthetic, qualitative, cold, cruel, relies on the contract and employs suspense and disavowal to expel the superego and father in favor of a de- and re-sexualized ego, the new man under auspice of the Oral Mother.
Deleuze at his most overtly psychoanalytic, but perhaps most accessible since the subject is singular and focused.
Deleuze at his most overtly psychoanalytic, but perhaps most accessible since the subject is singular and focused.
January 16, 2020
Whatever one thinks of the merits of taking a decidedly literary approach to problematize a clinical entity, it is undeniable that Coldness and Cruelty is a succinct, penetrating and systematically rigorous study of Masoch's proximity and distance from the sadism of Sade. Deleuze here treats Masoch's texts themselves as clinical material organized by a set of remarkably consistent traits--the triumph of fantasy, imagination, contract, disavowal, the Oral mother (between the whore mother and the mother as the father's sadist accomplice), "suspension" of a moment in icy eternity. As an insurrectionary from within, Deleuze calls into question the clinical and diagnostic validity of "sadomasochism" from within the field of psychoanalysis itself, generously helping himself to the latter's structuralist explanations and concepts. He proposes a masochism proper to sadism and a sadism proper to masochism. One notices a certain beauty and economy in Deleuze's liberal use of psychoanlytical concepts, particularly that of fantasy and disavowal. Ultimately, Deleuze can be seen as problematizing psychoanalysis' privileging of the Father in its treatment of masochism (the female figure with the whip as standing under the Father's shadow). Coldness and Cruelty is a brilliant study of Venus in Furs for its clarity and depth of insight and should be read alongside the original novella.
February 15, 2018
I confess a preexisting lukewarmness toward Deleuze stemming from a battle with "Bergsonism" years ago: the climb was wearying and the view unrewarding. But I read Sade recently, and as of today I'm still married, so it was time to find out just how much of a Masochist I must be. Cuz we all must be, more or less, now that Sade's prescription for universal prostitution has been enshrined as economic dogma and daily routine for both sexes. Furs and whips are optional.
The novel is more of a lugubrious melodrama than a racy romance. Radically distinguishing psychological from sensual masochism for a moment, the sad fatalism is summarized in tones echoing Dostoyevsky's unforgettable "Make us your slaves, but give us bread!" The narrator begs on page 202: "I will do whatever you command, I will be your slave, your thing; you may treat me as you please, but do not reject me. I shall be lost, I cannot live without you." And then to himself: "The comic side of my situation is that I can escape but do not want to; I am ready to endure anything as soon as she threatens to set me free." [Happy Valentine's Day.] The imperious Wanda even chastises him for being too weak to properly kill himself after he crawls back sopping wet and surrenders the dagger. So if you don't have enough pain, sadness, impotent longing, failure, shame, and humiliation in your own miserable life, have some of Severin's!
Deleuze is at least correct that masochism (and sadism) must not be confined to the hackneyed shades of a "pleasure-in-pain" continuum. There is not, as he repeats and repeats and repeats, a single sadomasochistic complex. Yet his overweening effort to categorically separate what masochism IS from what sadism IS and ne'er shall the twain meet is unconvincing, forced and a bit sloppy. He argues like one of the ancient Green rhetoricians who had to prove their skill by defending an obviously indefensible position, i.e., Helen of Troy was actually pretty cool. Deleuze's account is less interesting than those of Freud or Lacan, whom he purports to be critiquing. However, the chapter "Humor, Irony and the Law" stands out as some of his best writing.
The question "Why do people hug their chains?" has been asked and answered in myriad ways. The clinical riddle of masochism proper is not entirely separate from questions of mundane submissiveness and passivity, but they ought not be conflated. I can't say that in future inquiries I'll likely be adducing Masoch as a model of fulfilling intimacy or Deleuze as a satisfying theoretical touchstone.
The novel is more of a lugubrious melodrama than a racy romance. Radically distinguishing psychological from sensual masochism for a moment, the sad fatalism is summarized in tones echoing Dostoyevsky's unforgettable "Make us your slaves, but give us bread!" The narrator begs on page 202: "I will do whatever you command, I will be your slave, your thing; you may treat me as you please, but do not reject me. I shall be lost, I cannot live without you." And then to himself: "The comic side of my situation is that I can escape but do not want to; I am ready to endure anything as soon as she threatens to set me free." [Happy Valentine's Day.] The imperious Wanda even chastises him for being too weak to properly kill himself after he crawls back sopping wet and surrenders the dagger. So if you don't have enough pain, sadness, impotent longing, failure, shame, and humiliation in your own miserable life, have some of Severin's!
Deleuze is at least correct that masochism (and sadism) must not be confined to the hackneyed shades of a "pleasure-in-pain" continuum. There is not, as he repeats and repeats and repeats, a single sadomasochistic complex. Yet his overweening effort to categorically separate what masochism IS from what sadism IS and ne'er shall the twain meet is unconvincing, forced and a bit sloppy. He argues like one of the ancient Green rhetoricians who had to prove their skill by defending an obviously indefensible position, i.e., Helen of Troy was actually pretty cool. Deleuze's account is less interesting than those of Freud or Lacan, whom he purports to be critiquing. However, the chapter "Humor, Irony and the Law" stands out as some of his best writing.
The question "Why do people hug their chains?" has been asked and answered in myriad ways. The clinical riddle of masochism proper is not entirely separate from questions of mundane submissiveness and passivity, but they ought not be conflated. I can't say that in future inquiries I'll likely be adducing Masoch as a model of fulfilling intimacy or Deleuze as a satisfying theoretical touchstone.
July 7, 2012
Fascinating. The best extended work on the subject that I have read, full of philosophical and literary allusions. A great critical work that gives very careful and well thought-out analysis of Sade and Sacher-Masoch themselves, who, especially Sacher-Masoch, too often get left out of literature on the concepts that they inspired. Deleuze succeeds in showing that sadism and masochism are not symmetrical concepts that can be found in the same person, but are very specific concepts that exist in entirely different worlds. He also shows the emancipatory potential of each, favoring masochism's contracts over sadism's institutions. In terms of clinical analysis of sadism and masochism, I still prefer Lacan, but this is a great critical contribution.
June 26, 2021
interesting if only for living as an example of what sustained Deleuzian attention to psychoanalysis would look like� Logic of Sense fits this bill as well, but all writings afterwards consisting in the tearing up of said bill. Can’t help but feel like this wants to be a 20 page chapter of ATP, for there are some points that sustain themselves in the light of C&S’s attention, like that the s&m perversions both consist in a narrativization of egotism, or the interplay of legal form (law, contract) in those perversions. These are very C&S points! The perverted nightmare seems to consist in these limit points of the attempted rationalization on the body without organs, the construction of superegotic machines with the necessary force to destroy experience, or lock experience in affective loops even if the key affect is pain.
I picked this book up mostly because I saw there was a death instinct chapter, nevertheless one that begins with Deleuze himself praising the philosophical nature of Freud’s inquiry in Beyond the Pleasure Principle. Today I finally read that chapter and, well, predictably[!], I feel that I can fairly say that Deleuze makes the death instinct fall back on the pleasure instinct, at least insofar as the pleasure overwhelms the affective experience wherever the death instinct might guide experience. But if points like that are dry, or if I’m constructing said point where it isn’t definitive, it’s my fault for reading this book after Anti-Oedipus. I’m crazy
I picked this book up mostly because I saw there was a death instinct chapter, nevertheless one that begins with Deleuze himself praising the philosophical nature of Freud’s inquiry in Beyond the Pleasure Principle. Today I finally read that chapter and, well, predictably[!], I feel that I can fairly say that Deleuze makes the death instinct fall back on the pleasure instinct, at least insofar as the pleasure overwhelms the affective experience wherever the death instinct might guide experience. But if points like that are dry, or if I’m constructing said point where it isn’t definitive, it’s my fault for reading this book after Anti-Oedipus. I’m crazy
Read
September 9, 2023I’m. Speechless? (Derogatory)
December 19, 2022
Rating and reviewing Coldness and Cruelty, will return to Venus in Furs another time.
Deleuze makes a convincing case that 'sadomasochism' is a spurious misapplication of diagnostic categories. The sensitive, insightful readings of Masoch take him seriously as a thinker and a literary writer, correcting the common tendency to sideline him in favour of Sade. Unfortunately, Deleuze is slightly hyperbolic, tending to vindicate a 'good' Masoch against a 'bad' Sade, cutting against his own stated goal of not moralising sexual etiology.
***
Take two. Adding a star. Tracy McNulty's reading of this text has convinced me that it isn't just a one off spoof. There are serious speculative stakes in Masoch's fetishism. The cage of relativism sucks, even when the prison is made of words. We could try to force our way out, as Sade would suggest. Apart from not being very subtle, this strategy foolishly yearns for an apocalypse that will cleanse all evil so that we can start from scratch. Newsflash: the catastrophe has already happened; breaking the world further won't fix it. Masoch's way out is backbreaking, but in the long run more reliable. It's simple: make a contract with a mean bossy brat and subvert her from below. This fetish incarnates the most terrifying and sublime ideal: the maternal phallus. I completely agree with André’s patient Violette: unlike the pathetic male penis, the female phallus can't be castrated, because it doesn't exist.
Deleuze makes a convincing case that 'sadomasochism' is a spurious misapplication of diagnostic categories. The sensitive, insightful readings of Masoch take him seriously as a thinker and a literary writer, correcting the common tendency to sideline him in favour of Sade. Unfortunately, Deleuze is slightly hyperbolic, tending to vindicate a 'good' Masoch against a 'bad' Sade, cutting against his own stated goal of not moralising sexual etiology.
***
Take two. Adding a star. Tracy McNulty's reading of this text has convinced me that it isn't just a one off spoof. There are serious speculative stakes in Masoch's fetishism. The cage of relativism sucks, even when the prison is made of words. We could try to force our way out, as Sade would suggest. Apart from not being very subtle, this strategy foolishly yearns for an apocalypse that will cleanse all evil so that we can start from scratch. Newsflash: the catastrophe has already happened; breaking the world further won't fix it. Masoch's way out is backbreaking, but in the long run more reliable. It's simple: make a contract with a mean bossy brat and subvert her from below. This fetish incarnates the most terrifying and sublime ideal: the maternal phallus. I completely agree with André’s patient Violette: unlike the pathetic male penis, the female phallus can't be castrated, because it doesn't exist.
January 1, 2018
Deleuze attempts to show that sadism and masochism are not a "unity of opposites" , that is they are not in a dialectical relationship with one another, but rather they are their own separate phenomena. He mainly considers Freud but also mentions Lacan, Bataille, Klossowski, and Theodor Reik, among others. This is the first Deleuze I've read, and repetition plays a fairly big role in his explanation as it seems to in his philosophy in general. I can't say I was entirely convinced with his separation of the two, but I suspect this is due more to the dearth of knowledge I have vis-a-vis psychoanalysis rather than a poor thesis or bad exposition. Definitely a book I'll need to re-read when I have a firmer grasp of Freud & Lacan.
October 23, 2007
I really loved (is that the right word?) Venus in Furs. I was captivated by it. I read it in one sitting and need to read it again.
Deleuze is one of those French guys I probably should have read in grad school, but didn't. He's going to explore whether sadism and masochism are actually two sides of the same condition/phenomenon/psychological predisposition... I bet they're not.
Deleuze is one of those French guys I probably should have read in grad school, but didn't. He's going to explore whether sadism and masochism are actually two sides of the same condition/phenomenon/psychological predisposition... I bet they're not.
April 15, 2024
Definitely easier to wrap my head around in some parts than others
Very happy to say I have reached an academic point where I can actually understand (some, maybe most, not all) of what deleuze is saying here
Very happy to say I have reached an academic point where I can actually understand (some, maybe most, not all) of what deleuze is saying here
October 26, 2022
*4,5
-Guilt
-Guilt
March 15, 2016
Fascinating foray into the world of sexual deviance, power play, and gender fluidity. The writing style- short, dispersed sections that skip over certain points of plot and character development - leans more on the experimental side. You may need to fill in some dots yourself; that's fun, to a degree.
While the subject is cool, sexy, and provocative, the execution is somewhat tame - as fitting the time period in which the book was written. I don't mind this too much. It makes the book much more subversive in between the lines.
The climax, while contrived and somewhat predictable, is stunning in its debasement.
Read Deleuze's section on Coldness and Cruelty, which outlines the conditions for masochism and is an absolute gem. It makes Sacher-Masoch's story that much better. More interestingly is how S/M fits in with all the laws, contracts, and regulations that make up everyday life.
While the subject is cool, sexy, and provocative, the execution is somewhat tame - as fitting the time period in which the book was written. I don't mind this too much. It makes the book much more subversive in between the lines.
The climax, while contrived and somewhat predictable, is stunning in its debasement.
Read Deleuze's section on Coldness and Cruelty, which outlines the conditions for masochism and is an absolute gem. It makes Sacher-Masoch's story that much better. More interestingly is how S/M fits in with all the laws, contracts, and regulations that make up everyday life.
May 31, 2015
Read at least part of this for my critical theory/dead white men class at Macalester senior year and thought it would be interesting to take another look at.
Honestly, without the help of a prof, Deleuze's section was pretty over my head, even with the notes I'd already written in the margins. I do not have the prerequisite knowledge of philosophy and psychoanalysis to really understand most of what he's arguing here.
However, I highly enjoyed Sacher-Masoch's prose. I just wish I'd understood the analysis better.
Honestly, without the help of a prof, Deleuze's section was pretty over my head, even with the notes I'd already written in the margins. I do not have the prerequisite knowledge of philosophy and psychoanalysis to really understand most of what he's arguing here.
However, I highly enjoyed Sacher-Masoch's prose. I just wish I'd understood the analysis better.
March 30, 2007
Deleuze's section of this book is pretty good - he develops his theory that sadism and masochism are not two sides of the same coin, but separate pathologies - er, separate technologies of subversion.
Sacher-Masoch's prose is beyond all help, however; it's a shame that something so hot in theory is so boring in practice, but then Deleuze, reputed to be among the most vanilla of French theorists in his own personal life, must appreciate that.
Sacher-Masoch's prose is beyond all help, however; it's a shame that something so hot in theory is so boring in practice, but then Deleuze, reputed to be among the most vanilla of French theorists in his own personal life, must appreciate that.
August 26, 2010
"This provocative work places von Sacher-Masoch's classic 1870 novel Venus in Furs next to Deleuze's essay arguing that popular assumptions beginning with Freud have effectively obscured the unique power of von Sacher-Masoch's eroticism as well as the true nature of what might be called a masochist 'order.'"
—Keith Thompson, Utne Reader
—Keith Thompson, Utne Reader
May 5, 2020
As much a companion to Deleuze’s own thought (especially on the notions of difference and repetition) as it is Masoch and Sade’s. A really intriguing read, though after having spent a year grappling with the severe anti-Freudianism of Anti-Oedipus, it is strange to see Deleuze (at least apparently—perhaps a re-read will change my view) speak of Freud so well and so relatively uncritically.
March 7, 2013
I'm rating the Deleuze and Masoch separately. One, because I want to read 100 books this year and I think counting these as two separate books is fair. And also because I liked the Deleuze so much more than the Masoch.
August 18, 2007
i guess i'm not quite sure what to make of this book; it just doesn't seem like any of deleuze's other work.
August 14, 2008
not very sexy
January 17, 2025
Finally, I finished reading this book—just to finally say I read it! This is one of those books that, no matter how slightly you are interested in masochism, you’ll find it recommended as if it holds divine wisdom, a kind of Bible for masochism. It’s one of those works that supposedly legitimizes your opinion on the subject—because before reading it, you’re considered illiterate, and after, you’re said to have attained the ultimate truth of the topic. Now you can say whatever you want: you’ve read this diamond, this Newton-level breakthrough of a book.
Maybe that was my mistake. If I had read this book for what it is—literary analysis and the author’s opinions on Masoch and Sade viewed through a psychoanalytic lens—I might have liked it. But I came to it thirsting for answers about what makes Masoch Masoch. Why is he a masochist? How is his sexual life? How did he have sex? The man had children; there’s no way his only sexual experiences consisted of whipping and humiliation. I came here looking for diagnoses, medical explanations, pathologies, systematic classifications, material definitions—knowledge.
What I got instead was an explanation of how Masoch constructs his fantasies: the importance of rituals, the contract, the fantasy, the fetishes. But not why. The author merely analyzes Masoch’s novels (few as they are) and his wife’s confessions—which are mild, to say the least, when it comes to sexual detail. That’s why I felt cheated. The book is excessively complicated and hard to follow for what it is. The author loves to repeat himself, regurgitating the same three insights he has about masochism in every chapter. This stretches a hundred-some pages into what feels like ten thousand.
To summarize what he said:
One of the craziest ideas I read here, which the author attributes to Freud, is the concept of disavowal in fetishism. He explains it like this:
“The fetish is the image or substitute of the female phallus, that is, the means by which we deny that the woman lacks a penis. The fetishist's choice of a fetish is determined by the last object he saw as a child before becoming aware of the missing penis (a shoe, for example, in the case of a glance directed from the feet upward). Thus it appears that fetishism is first of all a disavowal (‘No, the woman does not lack a penis�); secondly, it is a defensive neutralization (since, contrary to what happens with negation, the knowledge of the situation as it is persists, but in a suspended, neutralized form); and thirdly, it is a protective and idealizing neutralization (for the belief in a female phallus is itself experienced as a protest of the ideal against the real; it remains suspended or neutralized in the ideal, the better to shield itself against the painful awareness of reality).�
Basically, what he’s saying is this: if you have a foot fetish, for example, you’re essentially in shock that women don’t have penises, so you substitute her lack of a penis with a foot. Your foot fetish is essentially a nonexistent-dick fetish! This is the gayest thing I’ve ever heard! Lol. I don’t have a foot fetish myself to validate this theory, but if anyone does and wants to share their opinion, come forward—let’s hear it.
The author then justifies the lack of obscenity in Masoch’s novels with this: it’s all in the suggestion. A whip is not a whip; fur is not fur, and so on. Based on the foot fetish example above, it’s not hard to assume the meanings behind these symbols.
Then he gets to his main argument—the one he repeats ad nauseam: sadism and masochism are not complementary. They do not exist together. Their universes are entirely different, as if from separate species. He summarizes his argument like this:
Sadism is speculative-demonstrative; masochism is dialectical-imaginative.
Sadism operates with the negative and pure negation; masochism operates with disavowal and suspension.
Sadism works through quantitative reiteration; masochism, through qualitative suspense.
There is a masochism specific to the sadist and a sadism specific to the masochist; the two never combine.
Sadism negates the mother and inflates the father; masochism disavows the mother and abolishes the father.
The role and significance of the fetish and the function of fantasy differ completely between the two.
Masochism has an aestheticism, while sadism is hostile to aesthetics.
Sadism is institutional; masochism is contractual.
In sadism, the superego and identification dominate; in masochism, the ego and idealization take precedence.
Sadism and masochism display radically different forms of desexualization and resexualization.
Summing it all up: sadism is marked by apathy, masochism by coldness.
Based on the above, you can decide whether to read the book or not. The author spends the entire work trying to justify these points, using every possible argument to do so. For me, I got some insights into the literary works of Masoch and Sade—but nothing more. Arguing with or against this book feels absurd. The author limits himself to a maximum of five books by Masoch and generalizes the entire concept of masochism based on them. As I said before, this is a comparative literary analysis, not a diagnostic medical work. Failing to understand this will only lead to disappointment.
That said, this book might have great value for people who create diagnostic criteria for personality disorders as it provides different perspectives. It attempts to distinguish and define characteristics of both sadism and masochism in its own way. As of today, we still don’t fully understand masochism. How do people practice it? Does it include intercourse—and how? Is it a perversion? Can these individuals lead comfortable lives? What’s wrong with them? What are the long term behavioral effects for those who practice it?
We know that Masoch spent his final years in an asylum, his mental illness devouring him. Maybe that gives us a hint.
Maybe that was my mistake. If I had read this book for what it is—literary analysis and the author’s opinions on Masoch and Sade viewed through a psychoanalytic lens—I might have liked it. But I came to it thirsting for answers about what makes Masoch Masoch. Why is he a masochist? How is his sexual life? How did he have sex? The man had children; there’s no way his only sexual experiences consisted of whipping and humiliation. I came here looking for diagnoses, medical explanations, pathologies, systematic classifications, material definitions—knowledge.
What I got instead was an explanation of how Masoch constructs his fantasies: the importance of rituals, the contract, the fantasy, the fetishes. But not why. The author merely analyzes Masoch’s novels (few as they are) and his wife’s confessions—which are mild, to say the least, when it comes to sexual detail. That’s why I felt cheated. The book is excessively complicated and hard to follow for what it is. The author loves to repeat himself, regurgitating the same three insights he has about masochism in every chapter. This stretches a hundred-some pages into what feels like ten thousand.
To summarize what he said:
One of the craziest ideas I read here, which the author attributes to Freud, is the concept of disavowal in fetishism. He explains it like this:
“The fetish is the image or substitute of the female phallus, that is, the means by which we deny that the woman lacks a penis. The fetishist's choice of a fetish is determined by the last object he saw as a child before becoming aware of the missing penis (a shoe, for example, in the case of a glance directed from the feet upward). Thus it appears that fetishism is first of all a disavowal (‘No, the woman does not lack a penis�); secondly, it is a defensive neutralization (since, contrary to what happens with negation, the knowledge of the situation as it is persists, but in a suspended, neutralized form); and thirdly, it is a protective and idealizing neutralization (for the belief in a female phallus is itself experienced as a protest of the ideal against the real; it remains suspended or neutralized in the ideal, the better to shield itself against the painful awareness of reality).�
Basically, what he’s saying is this: if you have a foot fetish, for example, you’re essentially in shock that women don’t have penises, so you substitute her lack of a penis with a foot. Your foot fetish is essentially a nonexistent-dick fetish! This is the gayest thing I’ve ever heard! Lol. I don’t have a foot fetish myself to validate this theory, but if anyone does and wants to share their opinion, come forward—let’s hear it.
The author then justifies the lack of obscenity in Masoch’s novels with this: it’s all in the suggestion. A whip is not a whip; fur is not fur, and so on. Based on the foot fetish example above, it’s not hard to assume the meanings behind these symbols.
Then he gets to his main argument—the one he repeats ad nauseam: sadism and masochism are not complementary. They do not exist together. Their universes are entirely different, as if from separate species. He summarizes his argument like this:
Sadism is speculative-demonstrative; masochism is dialectical-imaginative.
Sadism operates with the negative and pure negation; masochism operates with disavowal and suspension.
Sadism works through quantitative reiteration; masochism, through qualitative suspense.
There is a masochism specific to the sadist and a sadism specific to the masochist; the two never combine.
Sadism negates the mother and inflates the father; masochism disavows the mother and abolishes the father.
The role and significance of the fetish and the function of fantasy differ completely between the two.
Masochism has an aestheticism, while sadism is hostile to aesthetics.
Sadism is institutional; masochism is contractual.
In sadism, the superego and identification dominate; in masochism, the ego and idealization take precedence.
Sadism and masochism display radically different forms of desexualization and resexualization.
Summing it all up: sadism is marked by apathy, masochism by coldness.
Based on the above, you can decide whether to read the book or not. The author spends the entire work trying to justify these points, using every possible argument to do so. For me, I got some insights into the literary works of Masoch and Sade—but nothing more. Arguing with or against this book feels absurd. The author limits himself to a maximum of five books by Masoch and generalizes the entire concept of masochism based on them. As I said before, this is a comparative literary analysis, not a diagnostic medical work. Failing to understand this will only lead to disappointment.
That said, this book might have great value for people who create diagnostic criteria for personality disorders as it provides different perspectives. It attempts to distinguish and define characteristics of both sadism and masochism in its own way. As of today, we still don’t fully understand masochism. How do people practice it? Does it include intercourse—and how? Is it a perversion? Can these individuals lead comfortable lives? What’s wrong with them? What are the long term behavioral effects for those who practice it?
We know that Masoch spent his final years in an asylum, his mental illness devouring him. Maybe that gives us a hint.
August 4, 2023
my first REAL long-form foray into psychoanalysis. this was amazing something something abolishing the father from the symbolic order??! like who even comes up with that kinda thing? this book will probably stick with me for my entire life, deleuze creates coherence where there really shouldn’t be any and even my 1 sort of wish towards the end was to have some case studies but lo and behold the documents from masoch at the end of the book tied everything together, really appreciate bataille and masoch for writing fucked up shit and then analyzing exactly what moments in childhood led to their work
April 17, 2018
inappropriate enjoyment
October 31, 2020
Jedna zvjezdica manje zbog psihoanalize na koju mi se želudac okreće.
Sve u svemu, dosta dobrog materijala daje Delez, a veliki plus ide i na izjednačavanje značaja Sada i Mazoha!
Sve u svemu, dosta dobrog materijala daje Delez, a veliki plus ide i na izjednačavanje značaja Sada i Mazoha!
January 10, 2023
I am evermore anti-Oedipal after reading this
November 4, 2024
hornyyyyyy
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