Leopold von Sacher-Masoch

First published in 1870, this novella has since become the best-known of Sacher-Masoch's works. This Austrian author imagined an epic series entitled the 'Legacy of Cain, ' and "Venus in Furs" has become the most famous of the first volume. The nested narrative begins with a nameless narrator who dreams of speaking to the goddess Venus about love as she wears furs. When he confides these dreams to his friend Severin, a young Galacian nobleman, however, he is given a manuscript to read that will reveal the terrible secret of Severin. As the tale unfolds, Severin's desire for a ruthless woman to love is personified by Wanda, a beautiful and affluent widow who fulfills Severin's darkest wishes. So skilled is she at domination, however, that Severin is soon powerless to escape his cruel lover's clutches and degrading schemes. When reality and fantasy intermingle in this subtle, erotic classic, the result is the original definition and a masterful acknowledgement of the sexual inclination for masochism, now eponymous with Sacher-Masoch.

? Venus im Pelz? und ? Don Juan von Kolomea? sind zwei Erzählungen, in denen es um das ewige Thema Liebe geht und um die komplizierte Beziehung zwischen Mann und Frau. Im berühmt berüchtigten Roman ? Venus im Pelz? unterwirft sich der Mann, mit Namen Severin, auf eigenen Wunsch bedingungslos seiner Geliebten Wanda. Er liebt es, von ihr gedemütigt und auch körperlich gezüchtigt zu werden, und sie reizt dessen selbst auferlegte Unterwerfung bis zum Äußersten aus. Auf Grund dieses Inhalts prägte der Psychiater Richard von Krafft-Ebing im Jahre 1886 den Begriff >Masochismus

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Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1836 95) var en uppburen författare på sin tid: hans romaner var storsäljare och översattes till många språk. Allting ändrades i det ögonblicket då psykiatern Krafft-Ebing använde Masochs namn för att döpa en av de sexuella perversionerna, liksom han också använde Markis de Sades. Plötsligt blev Sacher-Masochs texter obscena. Venus i päls från 1870 räknas numera som en a

'Venus in Furs' describes the obsessions of Severin von Kusiemski, a European nobleman who desires to be enslaved to a woman. Severin finds his ideal of voluptuous cruelty in the merciless Wanda von Dunajew. This is a passionate and powerful portrayal of one man's struggle to enlighten and instruct himself and others in the realm of desire. Published in 1870, the novel gained notoriety and a degree of immortality for its author when the word "masochism" - derived from his name - entered the vocabulary of psychiatry. This remains a classic literary statement on sexual submission and control.

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.