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Not rating the book because I feel confused and divided about the book.


As someone who works in the child rights and child protection space, this book made me outrightly uncomfortable. I know I read Lolita around 7-8 years ago and thought "The premise is controversial, but look how beautiful the prose is." I don't think I'm that person anymore. I am not a prude when it comes to reading about sexual adventures, but I draw the line when it involves a child.

The introduction of this edition compares Incest to Lolita and lists down some remarkable similarities. The father, M. de Franval set his eyes on his daughter the moment she was born and separated her from her mother. Who looks at a newborn baby and finds them desirable? Well, we've clearly established that Franval's propensity towards his infant child was an unnatural proclivity. The book goes on to suggest that since the father is responsible for his daughter's utmost happiness, what's the harm if he's the one who's giving her that. What he does to his daughter is contentiously known as 'grooming'. It is when you condition a person into believing that the wrong happening to him/her is completely natural and is the way of life. (view spoiler)[The book has a tragic end, and where he realises his follies (including blasphemy) and suffers for his sins. Maybe it's a way of telling people that if you commit sins, you're not going to live happily ever after? (hide spoiler)]

During his lifetime, Sade was known to abuse both men and women. There are instances of him abusing children and mistreating the persons he would pay for sexual favours. He was incarcerated multiple times, and has written a lot of his works while he was in prison. What I was not aware of, was that the words sadist and sadism have been derived from his name. Wow. I wouldn't want to be that person.