Venus In Furs
My shrink told me to read Venus In Furs by Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch so we can talk about it on Tuesday.

As you may have guessed this is the book that gave us the term Masochism. It was the first published work of what, I guess, could be called FemDom erotica or looked at as a corollary to the works of the Marquis de Sade.

Unfortunately, de Sade has a much greater understanding of human sexuality than Masoch did. De Sade's stories are extreme but you can get involved in the characters and follow their desires.

Masoch's main character, Severin, is simply annoying for several reasons:

1. He's a complete idiot who doesn't listen to anything his lover says to him unless it's what he wants to hear.

2. He is topping from the bottom so much, that I'm not even sure he is an honest to god Masochist. He may be simply a controlling fuckwad.

3. He hates, hates hates women - and several times says that "women are the enemy." This is the complete opposite to most male subs - because we are sub because we love the power of female sexuality so much. Severin seems to hate female sexuality, which is why he wants to be whipped.

4. It's impossible for a modern reader to not wonder if Severin's real problem is that he's closet gay.

Here's the basic plot. A dude in his mid 20s is living in an apartment in a nice house when a beautiful young widow moves in next door. He immediately becomes obsessed with her - mostly because he has a fur fetish and she wears furs all the time.

The two of them court each other for a while at which point he proposes. She says that she thinks she loves him but is so recently widowed she wants to take it kinda slow to make sure of her feelings for him.

He then replies - totally out of the fucking blue - that if she won't agree on the spot to marry him then he wants to be her slave instead, needs her to whip him, wants her to fuck tons of other guys and eventually kill him while doing something kinky.

She responds that this squicks her because she really, really wants to be dominated by a man and doesn't get where the fuck he's coming from.

So, they don't talk about it for a while and continue to court during which time she realizes she's in love with him - and TELLS HIM SO. To this, he responds by rambling on and on to her about the whip and being her slave, etc...

Essentially in frustration she agrees to this, but tells him again and again that she really wants a man to dominate her not the other way around. And, she warns him time and time again that if he insists on this crap she might lose respect for him and find a "strong man."

It starts out with light punishments and afterward she tries to cuddle with him and talk about how much she loves him and wants him to talk about how much he loves her. He clearly does love her, but doesn't get the hint and begs to be beaten more and cheated on.

This frustrates her and eventually makes her enjoy beating him - but not because it gets her off, simply because he's less annoying when he's being treated like shit. At this point she starts telling him that she's no longer in love with him at all and is just treating him like this she because she's honestly curious as to how much shit he'll take before he leaves.

Down the line a Greek count that all the ladies in town want moves into a villa down the road and she creams her panties for him. Since Severin has been begging her to fuck someone else for like nine months at this point (and has in fact never fucked her or done anything sexual with her beyond sucking her tits) she decides to date the dude.

At which point Severin freaks the fuck out, threatens suicide, calls her a cheap whore and acts like a total possessive dick. She's like, WTF - you asked me to do this motherfucker! She's also squicked because even when Severin is screaming that he'll kill himself if she fucks him, he's also begging her to tell him how "beautiful" the Greek dude is - to the point where you have to wonder if what's really pissing him off is that he'd rather the Greek dude fuck him than his girlfriend/mistress/whatever Venus is to him at this point.

She's so frustrated and pissed off at Severin now that she decides to hurt him as badly and cruelly as possible. So, she tells him that the whole thing about not loving him anymore and wanting to bang the Greek dude was just role play and of course she's always loved him. She tells him to book a carriage so they can move somewhere where no one knows them and start a new vanilla life together as husband and wife.

He gets really happy and makes the arrangements. He comes back to the villa and she's like "let me tie you up one more time." He's like "sure!" As soon as he's tied up the Greek guy appears and beats the shit out of Severin. She then tells Severin that she's tired of his shit and is going off to marry the Greek.

Severin is like "what the fuck you are a total bitch/cunt/whore" and she's like "whatever dude, fuck off."

Three years go by and then one day Severin gets this letter from her:

"Now that over three years have passed since that night in Florence, I suppose I may confess to you that I loved you deeply. You, yourself, however stifled my love by your fantastic devotion and your insane passion. From the moment you became my slave I knew it would be impossible for you to ever become my husband. However, I found it interesting to have you realize your ideal in my own person, so I gloriously amused myself, perhaps, to cure you.

I found the strong man for whom I felt a need....

(boring text I'm skipping over)

...I hope you have been cured under my whip: the cure was cruel but radical. In memory of a woman who once loved you passionately I am sending you my portrait."

Severin's response to this is to decide that all women need to be beaten as much as possible. He buys all sorts of weird whips, hires young nubile servents and spends the rest of his life whipping them and fucking them.

The end. He closes by saying "No one can ever make me believe again that (women) are the image of God."

Fuck you dude! There are characters in low grade FemDom porn that make more sense than he does.

Thank fuck that dom/sub relationships have evolved past this point in the 130 years or so since this was written.