The Story of O

[MissTaken]

This book is often discussed and reviewed as basic BDSM reading.

Here is a link to the story.
It is difficult reading on line, but if it captures your interest, you may want to purchase the book.

I was wondering if anyone would be interested in discussing the story.

It is considered a work indicative of the feminist movement.

One may wonder how this could be as it is a story of a slave, in BDSM context of the word.

Anyway, happy reading!

http://www.angelfire.com/in/chains/soop1a.html

 

[navarre]

I have had this book since my freshman year in college (many, many years ago). Each time I read it again I enjoy it even more.
It is interesting to see how I view it now verses how I did while in college.

 

[MissTaken]

My first read through was at the bequest of my first Dom.

He often said he modelled himself after Stephen!

Ack! Sheer panic in a cursory read through.

(He wasn't much of a Dom though )

 

[navarre]

(He wasn't much of a Dom though )

I do agree. It would perhaps be interesting to go back and re-write it slightly, giving the story a stronger Dom.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

 

[Quint]

Read it online a few months ago out of curiosity. Didn't enjoy it very much. It pushed my idealistic view of sex, relationships, BDSM, and individuality a little further than I was comfortable with. I have too much sense of self to become immersed in a lifestyle like that. I'm actually rather incoherent on the subject, I realize...just feel a lot of discomfort and unease when I think about it.

 

[WickedEve]

I saw the story of O movie when I was about 19 or 20 -- this would have been 84-85. I remember being fascinated by it. I need to read the book and see the movie again. It will be interesting to see how I now perceive it.

 

[MissTaken]

Read it online a few months ago out of curiosity. Didn't enjoy it very much. It pushed my idealistic view of sex, relationships, BDSM, and individuality a little further than I was comfortable with. I have too much sense of self to become immersed in a lifestyle like that. I'm actually rather incoherent on the subject, I realize...just feel a lot of discomfort and unease when I think about it.

Ahhh, but didn't O manage to keep her own will and her own identity?

That is the great debate!

 

[Ebonyfire]

I read it, but do not remember much

I could not relate to O. I might find time to re-read it one day. Not being a sub, I have a different view of women.

Eb

 

[Kuurspet]

It's been a while

I haven't read it in quite a few years; sounds like a good time to re-read it. I liked it, liked the ritual, liked the fantasy, liked the clothing (M has purchased me an O-dress, I liked it a lot). I like her willingness to submit and accept. I recall not liking the last half of the book as well, but I'll have to see how I feel about it these days.

K

 

[cellis]

I have been struggling to read it on line for a couple of months now.

I have a lot of trouble identfy with the whole thing... but I will finish if we are going to have a discussion about it...

I can see it now... Oprah's book of the month... lol

wouldn't that be something....

 

[seXieleXie]

once upon a time in the mother thread someone who shall remain nameless promised to send me this book and it never happend. i still cry myself to sleep over the dissapointment i suffered.

 

[Never]

Speaking of books..
Does anyone know where Kurshal's Dart went to?
I know one of you have it.

 

[Pure]

Story of O.

It's too bad this book isn't better known in these parts; it's a porn literary classic, and those are rare. It's in our university library, if you can imagine! Well, OK, so is _120 Days of Sodom_.

The first time I read it it was amazingly erotic. Something that a reader may not notice is that the author, aside from certain sensations, doesn't go into O's thoughts, feelings, etc. While it may sound odd, this allows the reader to project.

There are dozens of points that are raised by the book, but here are a couple.

The writer is an author who wrote it for her lover, as an aphrodisiac. There are interviews with the author, who revealed herself after more than 30 years of unbreachable secrecy. (Virtually no one guessed her identity, in view of her apparent respectability.)

At the time it came out, most readers, esp. feminists, said, "This is not by a woman," since the woman in the story is effaced in her identity, besides being rather brutally used (simultaneously taken by mouth, vagina, and anus). Well, they were wrong, and the author just shows that a good writer can mentally enter a scene and make it convincing, regardless of gender. Incidentally, she did not undergo the rituals she wrote of, afaik.

The author, a professional translator of religious poems, brought out the religious aspect rather well, though one may miss it, or underestimate its importance. O's devotion to her masters is clearly paralleled to some of the saints' devotion to God, let's say,
St. John of the Cross. O undergoes a 'dark night of the soul', the aloneness and nothingness the true seeker experiences sometimes. There is a theme of 'the Lord loveth whom he chastizeth' as well as Job's famous words about God, "though he slay me, I will trust in him." O (the character) is French, and therefore, Catholic in upbringing

The story in my opinion, presents 'emptying' as key to submission;
this is a contrast to the current "self realization" (self-fulfillment), and "hand-in-hand" (co-questing) s/m promoted by many on this board: "My Master helps me realize myself as a person. He honors _me_ as I do, him." ** Abe Maslow in whips and chains.

If there are a few who want to discuss this work, I hope they will post. Those rare persons we don't hear enough from, imho.

J.
**Of course the Master is not necessarily 'he', I've just made it so, in this illustration.

 

[lilfrk]

Speaking of books..
Does anyone know where Kurshal's Dart went to?
I know one of you have it.

Me...I have it Never. I was supposed to send it on a few weeks ago but there was a death in my family and it got buried I'm hoping to get it sent out next week.

I've read it twice while I've had it though. There's a sequel to it now that I want to read.

 

[Sandia]

I've tried to read The Story of O a couple of different times, and failed. I really liked the opening scene, where O takes off her undergarments in the cab, on the way to the Chateau, but after that the story tends to leave me cold.

It feels clinical, objective, unreal... but I do know that O is considered a literary classic...

"The author's gender gave authority to the novel's premise of absolute carnal surrender as an avenue to divine grace, and Aury was the first woman to write so frankly and unsentimentally about her fantasies of bandage.... Aury's reticent viruosity - her withholding - is the foil for O's abject self-abandon."

~Judith Thurman

Is this what you're talking about, Pure?

 

[SexyChele]

I bought the book because I was told it was such an erotic literary classic. I think I read about half-way through and became bored with the whole thing. Besides using language such as "he filled my belly" (rather than vagina, sex, or any other words to describe the genitals) gave me a mental picture of this woman walking around with a hole where her belly button was. I realize this is probably a translation deal, but I found myself highly amused every time I read that phrase.

Perhaps I should try to go back and read it again. (Feels like a school assignment!) I know the book isn't long, and I could probably read it in one sitting. It's just I find it tedious, boring, and uninvolved. All the things I put books and don't read them again.

*sigh* Oh well, I don't like most of Nathaniel Hawthorne's work, and he's supposed to be a literary genius as well.

 

[Pure]

O

PS

Yes, friend, it's Lit-trah-tyure. So if you don't like Hawthorne, Poe, Camus, Hesse, Malamud, Updike; if short stories by F. O'Connor or Alice Munro bore you, this won't be your cuppa. As perhaps also a good chunk of Susie Bright's annual 'Best Erotica of ..."

Chaqu'un a son gout. (Loosely: Whatever raises your boat.)

J.

 

[SexyChele]

Re: O

PS

Yes, friend, it's Lit-trah-tyure. So if you don't like Hawthorne, Poe, Camus, Hesse, Malamud, Updike; if short stories by F. O'Connor or Alice Munro bore you, this won't be your cuppa. As perhaps also a good chunk of Susie Bright's annual 'Best Erotica of ..."

Chaqu'un a son gout. (Loosely: Whatever raises your boat.)

J.

Hmmm...not sure if this was directed at me or not, but I can tell you that Poe fascinates me - I love everything the man ever wrote - as does Updike. And, yes, Alice Munro does in fact bore me - to tears, almost. However, I have a passion for Shakespeare, and I actually enjoy Milton. Both authors that most people don't like or don't understand.

So, I guess that just goes to prove that "Lit-trah-tyure", as you choose to spell it, is truly in the eyes of the reader and not necessarily so because some entity has declared it so.

But, that is just my own humble opinion.

 

[MLadyPain]

I'm one of those that should re-read it.

Its been many years since I read it. I had already discovered the real time bdsm community, and someone suggested I read the book. They found highly erotic and thought I would "learn" from it.

Actually, it bored me. At that point in my life, I found it dull and dispassionate. To me the "O" seemed to be going thru the motions just to please some guy, that she was not really involved in what was going on.

But it could be like Vi Johnson's book, "To Love, To Obey, To Serve: Diary of an Old Guard Slave", something you have to read several times. With each reading I got more out of the book.

MLP

 

[Pure]

O

SexyC,

Glad you enjoy some of the 'greats'. The barb was perhaps excessive.

Incidentally, your list including Shakespeare and Milton hardly proves that choice of greats is pretty subjective, or that the
official arbiters of great literature are 'full of it'.

On 'belly.' It's 'ventre' in French. It translates as both 'belly' and 'womb', iow the lower abdomen. This is belly as in biology, not as in 'beer.' You might say it's a conceit then, that the penis penetrates to the womb or core of the woman.

It's true that Aury has a rather chaste vocabulary "...plunged into her sex." But do you think it's necessary to say "thrust his cock into her pussy" to get an effect?

Another feature of the style is restraint. A kind of coolness, as Sandia noted. To my way of thinking this heightens the impact, since some of the tortures, e.g. branding, are pretty nasty.
The famous rape scene of Selby's Last Exit to Brooklyn has this quality and is truly shocking.

The use of excessive words in porn arguably makes it ultimately flat-- "pistoned into her seething box." Do you agree?

In contrast, a Mistress's cool words, like a dr. in a clinic, have more erotic potential than yells of 'kiss my fucking feet you slimy scumbucket.'

Best,
J.

 

[morninggirl5]

Re: Story of O.

Something that a reader may not notice is that the author, aside from certain sensations, doesn't go into O's thoughts, feelings, etc. While it may sound odd, this allows the reader to project.

That's the main reason i didn't enjoy reading the book. When i'm reading i want to know the thoughts, feelings, motivations, and nuances of a character. Recently, i described the characters in this book as paper dolls, one dimensional, and unappealing.

Reader response theory says that there is an interaction between a reader and text and that the meaning is developed through this interaction. I felt like i was doing all the work reading this book, there wasn't enough in the text to allow me to formulate meaning. Reading for me is very emotional, when i read a good book i cry, laugh, smile, and ache along with the characters. This isn't a projection of myself into the book, but rather a reflection of how immersed i become into the lives of the characters. It was simply impossible for me to feel any of that with this book. I felt like i was reading an expository text such as "My Secret Garden."

 

[Sandia]

Pure, I agree that avoiding the "pussy," "cock," "fuck," words - or at least using them sparingly increases the erotic tension in a book.

I already said "O" left me a little flat... actually, I'm not even sure I'm entitled to an opinion, since I never finished it. But often the difference between a good book and an average one has to do with the level of involvement required from the reader.

I wish I could come up with a porn story that I thought was both "quality" and exciting.. but I'm coming up blank.

Perhaps erotic fiction - good erotic fiction - is especially hard to write?

 

[Pure]

Check Susie Bright's Annual, "Best American Erotica, 19xx" and see what you come up with. Also M. Sheiner's annual.

Beats me why you never hear mention of them around here.

J.

 

[SexyChele]

Re: O

Incidentally, your list including Shakespeare and Milton hardly proves that choice of greats is pretty subjective, or that the
official arbiters of great literature are 'full of it'.

On 'belly.' It's 'ventre' in French. It translates as both 'belly' and 'womb', iow the lower abdomen. This is belly as in biology, not as in 'beer.' You might say it's a conceit then, that the penis penetrates to the womb or core of the woman.

It's true that Aury has a rather chaste vocabulary "...plunged into her sex." But do you think it's necessary to say "thrust his cock into her pussy" to get an effect?

I really don't want to get into an argument on what one considers to be good literature. It's as non-productive as stating what is a classic movie - it is just too subjective. It comes down to a personal individual and what they get out of the story, or what they don't.

By the way, Pure, my reflections on "The Story of O" are not meant to demean anyone who likes the story and gets something out of it. If some one reads it and likes it, that's great. But I also reserve my right to say I don't like it. And my opinion is just as valid as the person who liked the book. That was even true in all those English and American Lit classes I took. You seem to be taking any opinion from people who didn't like the book as though it is almost something personal. It isn't. They are just opinion.

As for the language, I am bright enough to know that "belly" and "womb" in the book are substitutes for the English "vagina". Sorry, not that stupid. But, as any book that is translated from a native language into another language, some things are lost. It's inevitable. Ideally, the best scenario would be to read this book in French. Alas, my skills don't stretch that far. (And French is simply not a language I have a desire to learn) All I said was that when I read those words, they seemed ridiculous to me. Me. I. Myself. Others can read them and they are fine with them. That's great, they have one over on me. To me, it illicits a smile.

But perhaps you will be proud of me when I say I actually dug the book up and intend to read it again tonight. There. Better? Maybe I'll have a different opinion tomorrow. Today's opinion is that I didn't like it. Tomorrow's maybe different. I make no guarantees.

 

[Pure]

SC--

Don't mean to upset you. You said,

>As for the language, I am bright enough to know that "belly" and "womb" in the book are substitutes for the English "vagina". Sorry, not that stupid. //

I think you're plenty bright, and never said otherwise.

I don't think 'belly' is a 'substitute' for 'vagina.'

French has words for pussy, vagina, and 'belly' (lower ab. or womb). Aury chose the word for 'belly'. Likewise, her most common term for O's vulva/vagina is "her sex" (son sexe). It seems rather chaste and restrained. That is her decision. It would be a mistake for the English translation of 'sexe' to be rendered as 'vagina' or 'pussy', since if she wanted to be direct or 'graphic' or vernacular, she would have been. French has the resources (son minou = her pussy).

The point you haven't addressed is how erotic can one be without getting graphic or vernacular? How is her erotism achieved? (I say 'achieved' since it's a best seller.)

J.