1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die

  • Gulliver's Travels
  • Roxana
  • Moll Flanders
  • Love In Excess
  • Robinson Crusoe
  • A Tale of a Tub
  • Oroonoko
  • The Princess of Cleves

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

47. The 120 Days of Sodom by Marquis de Sade

I've been reading books over Christmas but not in chronological order, so I'm just now reading 120 Days of Sodom.  It's heavy going.  De Sade seems to want to catalogue every possible perversion.  He admits that a lot of it won't appeal, but promises his readers they'll find something that turns them on.

Four evil and powerful men take their accomplices and victims to a remote location, where they listen to pornographic stories which stimulate them to try out what they've heard.  The stories progress from relatively innocuous incest, cophrophragy and whipping and progress to torture, mutilation and death.  After a while even De Sade gets bored and simply describes variations, rather than telling stories about them.

I made it to the end, and felt filthy afterwards.

No comments:

Post a Comment