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Camille Paglia

Camille Anna Paglia is a social critic, intellectual, author, and teacher. She is University Professor of Humanities and Media Studies at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia, colloquially referred to as Philly, and known as The City of Brotherly Love i... 

. She has been called the "feminist that other feminists love to hate", one of the world's top 100 intellectuals The 2005 Global Intellectuals Poll

The 2005 Global Intellectuals Poll is a list of the 100 most important living public intellectual [i]s i ... 

 by the UK's Prospect Magazine, and by her own description "a feminist Feminism

Feminism is a diverse collection of social theories [i], political movement [i]s and moral philosophies [i] ... 

 bisexual Bisexuality

Bisexuality is the sexual orientation which refers to the aesthetic [i], romantic [i], or ... 

 egomaniac" .

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Timeline

1947   Born



Encyclopedia



Camille Anna Paglia is a social critic, intellectual, author, and teacher. She is University Professor of Humanities and Media Studies at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia, colloquially referred to as Philly, and known as The City of Brotherly Love i... 

. She has been called the "feminist that other feminists love to hate", one of the world's top 100 intellectuals The 2005 Global Intellectuals Poll

The 2005 Global Intellectuals Poll is a list of the 100 most important living public intellectual [i]s i ... 

 by the UK's Prospect Magazine, and by her own description "a feminist Feminism

Feminism is a diverse collection of social theories [i], political movement [i]s and moral philosophies [i] ... 

 bisexual Bisexuality

Bisexuality is the sexual orientation which refers to the aesthetic [i], romantic [i], or ... 

 egomaniac" .

Introduction

Paglia is an intellectual of many seeming contradictions: a classicist Classicism

Classicism, in the arts [i], refers generally to a high regard for classical antiquity [i], as ... 

 who champions art both high and low, with a view that human nature is inherently dangerous, while at the same time celebrating dionysian Dionysus

Dionysus and Dionysos or Dionysius , the Thracian [i] god of wine [i], represents not only t... 

 revelry in the wilder, darker sides of human sexuality.

She came to public attention shortly after the publication of her first book, Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti Nefertiti

Nefertiti was the Great Royal Wife [i] of the Egypt [i]ian Pharaoh [i] Amenhotep IV [i], and mother-in-l ... 

 to Emily Dickinson Emily Dickinson

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American [i] poet [i]. ... 

, in 1990, when she began writing about popular culture and feminism Feminism

Feminism is a diverse collection of social theories [i], political movement [i]s and moral philosophies [i] ... 

 in mainstream newspapers and magazines. As a public intellectual, Paglia challenged the positions of the so-called "liberal establishment" at the time, which included figures in media, academia, activism and politics such as Gloria Steinem Gloria Steinem

Gloria Steinem is an American [i] feminist [i] icon, journalist [i] and women's r ... 

, Andrea Dworkin, professors at many Ivy League universities, and organizations such as National Organization for Women and ACT UP.

She describes herself as a feminist Feminism

Feminism is a diverse collection of social theories [i], political movement [i]s and moral philosophies [i] ... 

, and as a Democrat who voted for Bill Clinton Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States [i], serving from 1993 to ... 

 and Ralph Nader Ralph Nader

Ralph Nader is an American [i] attorney and political activist [i]. ... 

. Her world view embraces risque elements such as fetishism, pornography Pornography

Pornography, more informally referred to as porn or porno, is the representation of the human body [i] ... 

, and prostitution Prostitution

Prostitution is the sale of sexual [i] services for money [i] or other kind of return. ... 

. She is a critic of contemporary feminists, comparing victim-focused feminists with the Moonies. As a proponent for the legalization of recreational drugs and prostitution, and the lowering of sexual consent laws, she identified herself with libertarian Libertarianism

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Libertarianism is a political philosophy [i] advocating that individuals should be free to do ... 

 thought.

Critical of the influence that French philosophers Jacques Lacan Jacques Lacan

Jacques-Marie-mile Lacan was a French [i] psychoanalyst [i], psychiatrist [i], and doctor [i]... 

, Jacques Derrida and Michel Foucault Michel Foucault

Michel Foucault was a French philosopher [i] who held a chair at the Collge de France [i]... 

 had on the teaching of humanities in American academia, she supported comparative religion, art history History of art

The history of art usually refers to the history [i] of the visual arts [i], such as painting [i], sculpture [i]... 

 and the close reading of canonical literature being brought to the center of education Education

Education is the process by which an individual is encouraged and enabled to develop fully his or her in... 

, with greater attentiveness toward chronology and facts in the student's approach to history.

Her most notable allies and supporters , were Andrew Sullivan Andrew Sullivan

Andrew Sullivan is an British [i]-American [i] journalist, author, blog [i]ger and... 

, Christina Hoff Sommers, Virginia Postrel, Harold Bloom Harold Bloom

Harold Bloom, Ph.D. [i], is an American [i] professor [i] and promine ... 

, Bill Maher Bill Maher

William "Bill" Maher, Jr., is an American [i] comedian [i], actor [i], writer [i], and producer [i] ... 

, and Matt Drudge Matt Drudge

Matthew Drudge is an American [i] Internet [i] journalist and a talk radio host. ... 

. Elise Sutton, a dominatrix who advocates female domination of males, describes Paglia as a female supremacist and a friend.

In addition to writing books, she has been a columnist for Salon.com Salon.com

Salon.com is an Internet [i]-based media [i] company founded in 1995 [i] by editor-in-chief David Talbot [i]... 

 since its inception, is currently a contributing editor at Interview magazine Interview

*The Rolling Stone Interview [i] - a number of very influential pop-cultural interviews in the 70's
... 

, and is on the editorial board of the classics and humanities journal Arion Arion

Arion was a legendary poet and citharode [i] in ancient Greece [i] who lived in the court of Periander [i] ... 

. She continues to write articles and reviews for popular media and scholarly journals, such as her long article, "Cults and Cosmic Consciousness: Religious Vision in the American 1960s," published in Arion in winter 2003.

In September 2005, she was ranked #20 in a survey of the "Top 100 Public Intellectuals" in the world, in a list compiled jointly by editors of the journals "Foreign Policy" and "The Prospect" . The list, which included only 10 women, also included feminist thinkers Germaine Greer Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer is an Australian [i] academic, writer, and broadcaster, who is widely regarded ... 

, Martha Nussbaum Martha Nussbaum

Martha Nussbaum is an American [i] philosopher [i], with a particular interest ... 

, and Julia Kristeva.

She is currently writing a third essay collection for Vintage Books, and working on a book to serve as a companion piece to Break, Blow, Burn, which will be concerned with the visual arts Visual arts

The visual arts are a class of art forms [i], including painting [i], sculpture [i], film [i] ... 

 rather than poetry.

Biography

Camille Anna Paglia was born April 2, 1947 in Endicott, New York. She was the first of two daughters by Pasquale and Lydia Anne Paglia. Her mother was born in Ceccano, Italy. Her father's family came from Benevento Benevento

Benevento is a town and comune [i] of Campania [i], Italy [i], capital of the province of Benevento [i] ... 

, Avellino Avellino

Avellino is a town and comune [i], capital of the province of Avellino [i] in the Campania [i] region of ... 

, and Caserta.

The Paglia household had little money, but the parents exposed their daughter to classical Western art and culture; and throughout her childhood, she was drawn to several figures in art, popular culture and history. These interests would continue throughout her life, and deeply influence her work as a scholar and critic. For example, she said that the first music to leave an impression on her was Bizet Georges Bizet

Georges Bizet was a French [i] composer [i] and pianist [i] of the romantic [i] e ... 

's Carmen Carmen

Carmen is a French [i] opera [i] by Georges Bizet [i]. ... 

, an opera which, in her words, "struck me with electrifying force." She was three when she first heard it, but she was still enamored with the opera and was writing about it over 40 years later.

Paglia's primary school years were spent in rural Oxford, New York, where her family lived in a working farmhouse. Her father taught high school students at the Oxford Academy. When she was in the fifth grade, her family moved to Syracuse, New York Syracuse, New York

Syracuse is a city in Central [i] New York [i], USA [i]. ... 

, where her father entered graduate school and then taught as a professor of romance languages at Le Moyne College Le Moyne College

Le Moyne College is a four-year Jesuit [i] college [i] of approximately 2,300 undergraduate [i] ... 

. She attended the Edward Smith Elementary school, T. Aaron Levy Junior High and William Nottingham High School.

By all accounts, she was an excellent student at Nottingham High, devoted to her work. She spent her Saturdays in the Carnegie Library, absorbed in books and manuscripts. Carmelia Metosh was her Latin Latin

Latin is an ancient Indo-European language [i] originally spoken in Latium [i], ... 

 teacher for three years, and in 1992 recalled: "She always has been controversial. Whatever statements were being made , she had to challenge them. She made good points then, as she does now. She was very alert, 'with it' in every way." Paglia thanked Metosh in the acknowledgements to Sexual Personae, and later described her as "the dragon lady of Latin studies, who breathed fire at principals and school boards."

During the summers, she went to Spruce Ridge Camp Scouting in New York

Scouting in New York has a long history, from the 1910s [i] to the present day, serving thousands of you ... 

, a Girl Scout Girl Scouts of the USA

The Girl Scouts of the United States of America is a youth organization [i] founded by Juliette Gordon L ... 

 facility in the Adirondacks Adirondack Mountains

The Adirondack mountain range is a group of mountains in the northeastern part of New York [i] that runs ... 

 where, she later said, she had crushes on all the female counselors. She took different names when she was there, including Anastasia , Stacy, and Stanley. In one formative experience, she exploded the outhouse by pouring in too much lime. She said, "It symbolized everything I would do with my life and work. Excess and extravagance and explosiveness. I would be someone who would look into the latrine of culture..."

The year 1963 was the beginning of her career as a feminist scholar. For her birthday that year, she received a copy of Simone de Beauvoir Simone de Beauvoir

Simone de Beauvoir was a French [i] author [i] and philosopher [i]. ... 

's The Second Sex from a Belgian colleague of her father's, Josphina van Hal McGinn. The book had a tremendous influence on her and furthered her resolve to be an important feminist writer. On July 8 of that year, Newsweek Newsweek

Newsweek is a weekly newsmagazine [i] published in New York City [i] and distributed throughout the ... 

magazine published her letter about equal opportunity for American women. And on November 24, she appeared in Syracuse's Herald American in a short profile about her outstanding achievements as a student, noting her longtime study of feminist icon Amelia Earhart Amelia Earhart

Amelia Mary Earhart, daughter of Edwin and Amy Earhart, was an American [i] aviator [i] an ... 

.

Paglia had been writing a book about Earhart, spending three years gathering materials and writing nearly 300 letters of inquiry to do so. She said, "I spent every Saturday in the bowels of the public library going through all these materials, old magazines and newspapers, before microfilm. Everything was falling to pieces. I probably destroyed the whole collection! I was covered with grime." But after reading The Second Sex she resolved to write a "mega-book that will take everything in", and stopped writing about Earhart. It was then that she began "Sexual Personae".

College years


Binghamton University, Harpur College
She started attending Binghamton University Binghamton University

Binghamton University, also known as the State University of New York at Binghamton, is a public u... 

, called Harpur College in 1964, and graduated as valedictorian of her class in 1968. The essays she wrote during those years, on questions of "sexual ambiguity and aggression in literature, art, and history" formed the first beginnings of "Sexual Personae".

It was at Harpur, she later wrote, that she received her real education in poetry. There she took courses in Metaphysical poetry and John Milton John Milton

Milton redirects here, for other uses, see Milton [i]
... 

 from Arthur L. Clements, an expert in 17th century literature. But the biggest impact on her thinking occurred in the classes of poet Milton Kessler, who had studied under Theodore Roethke. "He believed in the responsiveness of the body, and of the activation of the senses to literature," she has said. "And oh did I believe in that. Probably from my Italian background — that’s the way we respond to things, with our body. From Michelangelo Michelangelo

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni , commonly known as Michelangelo, was an Italian Renaissance [i] ... 

, Bernini Gian Lorenzo Bernini

Gian Lorenzo Bernini was a pre-eminent Baroque [i] sculptor [i] and architect of 17th centur ... 

, there’s this whole florid physicality leading right down to the Grand Opera, the great arias."

She wrote her senior thesis on Emily Dickinson Emily Dickinson

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American [i] poet [i]. ... 

, and aspired to be a poet herself, inspired by the work of Edna St. Vincent Millay Edna St. Vincent Millay

Edna St. Vincent Millay was a lyrical poet [i] and playwright and the first woman to receiv ... 

 and Gerard Manley Hopkins Gerard Manley Hopkins

Gerard Manley Hopkins was a British [i] Victorian [i] poet [i] and Jesuit [i] ... 

. She submitted a reconfiguration of the Dido Dido

In Greek and Roman sources Dido or Elissa appears as the founder and first Queen of Carthage [i]. ... 

 episode of Virgil Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro , later called Virgilius, and known in English [i] as V ... 

's Aeneid Aeneid

The Aeneid : is a Latin [i] epic [i] written by Virgil [i] in the 1st century BC [i] th ... 

 to the college literary magazine, but its editor, Deborah Tannen Deborah Tannen

Deborah Frances Tannen is an American [i] professor [i] of sociolinguistics [i] at Georgetown University [i] ... 

 rejected it, saying that "Poets don't write like this anymore."

While at college she became friendly with Bruce Benderson , Stephen Jarratt and Stephen Feld, three gay men who would have a big influence on her. During a summer break, her father got her a job working the night shift at St. Joseph's Hospital in Syracuse as a secretary in the emergency ward. "It was unbelievable, like being in a war without any danger to myself," she later said. "I forced myself to look at every single horrible thing - once, OK? After a while, you start to adjust. It was pivotal because it's one of the reasons I'm not sentimental at all about death or disease."

At college, she did not fit the typical gender roles. When she was 19, she hit a young drunken stranger in the teeth with her right fist in order to protect a small student whom he and a friend were groping on the street. One semester she was put on probation for committing 39 pranks, a fact that she has been proud to share. She told an interviewer in 2003 that she follows the model of the "Hindu Hindu

A Hindu , as per modern definition, is an adherent of the philosophies and scriptures of [[Hinduism]... 

 guru Guru

A Guru is a teacher [i] in Hinduism [i], Buddhism [i], and Sikhism [i]. ... 

s, the aging masters and sages" because they're "Actually very funny. They're funny, they're prankish. Zen Zen

Zen is a branch of Mahayana [i] Buddhism [i] which strongly emphasizes the practice of moment-by-moment ... 

 masters are known to be prankish." She said, "To me, comedy is a symptom of a balanced perspective on life, and people who are going around, like gloomy gusses, in that Sontag style of intellectual, these people are suffering from something coming from their childhood, it has nothing to do with the proper intellectual response to life..."
Yale Graduate School

She next went on to Yale Graduate School, just as the women's movement and gay liberation exploded into American consciousness, yet Paglia found conflict at the university due to her sexual orientation and sexually ambiguous persona. A friend of hers at the time, Robert Caserio, recalled in 1996:

"She did not act in a way that convention there dictated. Yale was an extremely genteel place. Camille wasn't genteel. She was so upfront and she wore pants in a very aggressive way. She was an out-feminist and identified with gay sexuality. We were all very much more discreet."


Just a few months after beginning her studies she attended a party in the home of R. W. B. Lewis, one of her teachers, and ended up being insulted by a prominent Yale psychiatrist named Robert Jay Lifton and his wife for being a lesbian. Lifton, at that time, was the Foundations' Fund Research Professor in Psychiatry at Yale, a position he held until 1984. His attack seems to have emboldened her not only to be out as a lesbian, but to be in everyone's face about it. She has repeatedly noted she was publicly out as a lesbian at Yale Graduate School Yale University

Yale University is a private university in New Haven, Connecticut [i]. ... 

, and was actually the only open lesbian there from 1968 to 1972.

While studying at Yale, Paglia quarreled with Rita Mae Brown Rita Mae Brown

Rita Mae Brown is a prolific American [i] writer [i] and social activist [i], notable for ... 

, whom she later characterised as "then darkly nihilist", and fought with the New Haven, Connecticut New Haven, Connecticut

New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut [i] after Bridgeport [i] . ... 

 Women's Liberation Rock Band because they dismissed the Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones

The Rolling Stones are an English [i] rock and roll [i] band that rose to prominence in the earl ... 

 as "sexist." She also "had two close encounters with Kate Millett  just after she became famous, in New Haven, Connecticut New Haven, Connecticut

New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut [i] after Bridgeport [i] . ... 

, and Provincetown, Massachusetts Provincetown, Massachusetts

Provincetown is a town [i] located at the extreme tip of Cape Cod [i] in Barnstable County, Massachusetts [i]... 

, but she was too morosely self-absorbed to notice." Because of what she saw as Millett's "careless" attitude toward scholarship, Paglia became critical of her and those who supported her work.

Her study of sexuality in Western literature continued to develop with her reading of D. H. Lawrence D. H. Lawrence

David Herbert Lawrence was an important and controversial English [i] writer of the 20th century [i] ... 

's Women in Love Women in Love

Women in Love is a novel [i] by British [i] author [i] D. H. Lawrence [i] ... 

and Edmund Spenser's Edmund Spenser

Edmund Spenser was an English [i] poet [i] and Poet Laureate [i]. ... 

 Faerie Queene The Faerie Queene

The Faerie Queene is an English epic poem [i] by Edmund Spenser [i], published first in ... 

. In 1970, she wrote a 160-page paper for her last graduate seminar at Yale entitled "Male and Female in Virginia Woolf Virginia Woolf

Virginia Woolf is by reputation one of the foremost modernist [i] literary [i] ... 

." Her original projection for her book "Sexual Personae" was that it would end with her study of Woolf and Lawrence.

She discovered Kenneth Clark's Kenneth Clark

Kenneth McKenzie Clark, Baron Clark of Saltwood, OM [i] CH [i] KCB [i] ... 

 The Nude while browsing the shelves of Yale's Sterling Library in 1971, a book which would have a profound impact on her writing. "If ever I was in love with a book, it was with this one," she wrote in Sex, Art & American Culture; and in an article for Women's Quarterly in 2002, she called it "the best introduction by far to representation of the human figure in art." The book influenced her writing in her Yale dissertation and subsequent works.

In 1971 she received a Master's Degree in Philosophy from Yale, and began looking for a teaching job. In May 1972 she was hired by Bennington College, thanks to a recommendation by Harold Bloom Harold Bloom

Harold Bloom, Ph.D. [i], is an American [i] professor [i] and promine ... 

. In the meantime, she continued to work on her Ph.D dissertation, which at this point was being written under the title of "The Androgynous Dream: the image of the androgyne as it appears in literature and is embodied in the psyche of the artist, with reference to the visual arts and the cinema." Bloom, her mentor and adviser, found one fault in the draft he read in 1971. He cautioned in the margin that one passage was "Mere Sontagisme!" Paglia later wrote, "It saddened me, but I knew Bloom was right. Susan Sontag Susan Sontag

Susan Sontag was a well-known American [i] essay [i]ist, novel [i]ist, intellectual [i], filmmaker [i] ... 

, who could have been Jane Harrison's Jane Ellen Harrison

Jane Ellen Harrison was a ground-breaking British [i] classical [i] ... 

 successor as a supreme woman scholar, had become synonymous with a shallow kind of hip posturing."

In a letter dated February 13, 1972 to Carolyn Heilbrun at Columbia University Columbia University

Columbia University is a private [i] university [i] whose main campus lies in the Morningside Heights [i] ... 

, Paglia asked for information about her forthcoming book on androgyny; Heilbrun responded with a letter saying that her book would not be able to deal with all available material on that subject. Asked about Paglia's inquiry several years later, Heilbrun did not remember receiving the letter. When "Toward a Recognition of Androgyny" came out, Paglia gave a thoroughly negative assessment of it in a review for the Summer 1973 issue of the journal the Yale Review. "Heilbrun's book is so poorly researched that it may disgrace the subject in the eyes of serious scholars," she wrote. She noted that "the most distinguished commentators on androgyny are Mircea Eliade Mircea Eliade

Mircea Eliade was a Romanian [i] historian [i], philosopher [i], theorist of religion [i] ... 

 and G. Wilson Knight"; and criticized Heilbrun for her reliance on the work of Joseph Campbell Joseph Campbell

Joseph Campbell was an American [i] professor [i], writer [i], and orator [i] best known ... 

, and for including "four flattering references" to Kate Millett while making "fifteen glib jibes" at Sigmund Freud Sigmund Freud

Sigmund Freud
The name Freud is generally pronounced [i] [] in English [i] and [] in German [i] ... 

. The article showed that the reviewer was an expert on the history of sexual androgyne, but as it was the journal's policy for reviews to be published without attribution, few people knew that Paglia wrote it.

Teaching career

In the fall of 1972, she began her first semester teaching at Bennington College Bennington College

Bennington College is a liberal arts college [i] located in Bennington, Vermont [i]. ... 

. There she met James Fessenden, a philosophy instructor from Columbia University, who started teaching at the same time as Paglia. In January 1997, Mark W. Edmundson, now a professor at the University of Virginia, recalled attending Bennington while Paglia was there:

"She was appointed as my faculty advisor in her first term. I went in for my advisorial visit and she was entirely herself, talking very fast about many things I knew nothing about. I ran in fear. Alas, I was too puzzled to take any of her classes, which seemed to be full of very sophisticated people from LA and from New York."


Writer Heidi Schmidt, who attended her classes, recalled in 1996:

"She was thought of as peculiar. She was so full of excitement and so intense. She would light one cigarette and then forget about it and light another, so she was waving two cigarettes. I think people took her quite lightly, she was thought of as eccentric."


Another student at Bennington while Paglia was there was Judith Butler, who went on to a very successful career in academe, a success that was not well deserved in Paglia's estimation. As she explained to one interviewer:

"She was a student when I was at my first job at Bennington in the 70s, and I saw her up close. And I know what she knows. I mean, she transferred from there, to Yale, and her background in anything is absolutely minimal. She started a career in philosophy, abandoned that, and has been taken as this sort of major philosophical thinker by people in literary criticism. But has she ever made any exploration of science? For her to be dismissing biology, and to say gender is totally socially constructed — where are her readings, her studies? It’s all gameplay, wordplay, and her work is utterly pernicious, a total dead-end."


In 1973, she achieved her first scholarly publication. Originally a term paper for a class taught under Maynard Mack, who urged her to seek its publication, "Lord Hervey and Pope Alexander Pope

Alexander Pope is generally regarded as the greatest English [i] poet [i] of the early eighteen ... 

," eventually appeared in the journal
18th Century Studies  In April, she traveled to see Susan Sontag lecture at Dartmouth College Dartmouth College

Dartmouth College is a private [i] academic institution in Hanover [i], New Hampshire [i] ... 

 and later invited her to Bennington. Sontag spoke there on October 4th, an event that caused much controversy at the college since she read a short story instead of giving a cultural lecture, as she had agreed to. Paglia later commented, "I was stunned because I thought she was going to be a major intellectual," and then wrote about the meeting at length in a catty essay entitled "Sontag, Bloody Sontag," published in "Vamps & Tramps".

Another intellectual disappointment for Paglia was Marija Gimbutas Marija Gimbutas

Marija Gimbutas Lithuanian-American archeologist, researcher of the Neolithic [i] and Bronze Age [i] cul ... 

, who published The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe in 1974. At the same time, Paglia launched "a detailed attack on an exhibit at Bennington's Crossett Library, 'Matriarchy: The Golden Age,' which used appallingly shoddy feminist materials alleging the existence of a peaceful, prehistoric matriarchy, later supposedly overthrown by nasty males."

Through her study of the classics and her reading of the scholarship of Jane Ellen Harrison Jane Ellen Harrison

Jane Ellen Harrison was a ground-breaking British [i] classical [i] ... 

, James George Frazer James Frazer

* The Golden Bough [i], 2nd edition
... 

, Erich Neumann and others, Paglia had developed a theory of sexual history that was in opposition to the ideas in vogue at the time, which is why she was so critical of Gimbutas, Heilbrun, Millet and others. She laid out her ideas on matriarchy, androgyny, homosexuality, sadomasochism and many other topics in her dissertation Sexual Personae: The Androgyne in Literature and Art, which she completed in December 1974, at the age of 27. She gave a public lecture drawing from material in the dissertation at Bennington College in September 1976, where she discussed Edmund Spenser Edmund Spenser

Edmund Spenser was an English [i] poet [i] and Poet Laureate [i]. ... 

's Faerie Queene The Faerie Queene

The Faerie Queene is an English epic poem [i] by Edmund Spenser [i], published first in ... 

, followed by remarks on Diana Ross, Gracie Allen Gracie Allen

Gracie Allen was an American comedian [i] who became internationally famous as the zany partner and comi ... 

, Yul Brynner Yul Brynner

Yul Brynner was a Russian [i]-born Broadway [i] and Academy Award [i]- ... 

, and Stephane Audran Stéphane Audran

... 

.

In March of 1975, she drove from Vermont to Albany Albany, New York

official_name = City of Albany, New York
... 

 to see Germaine Greer Germaine Greer

Germaine Greer is an Australian [i] academic, writer, and broadcaster, who is widely regarded ... 

 speak. She was disappointed, reporting later that "During the question period, I nervously raised my hand from the crowd and asked if Greer, a former English professor, would be writing on literary subjects again soon. Her reply was stern and swift: 'There are far more important things in the world than literature!'"

Another time at Albany, Paglia "nearly came to blows with the founding members of the women's-studies program at the State University of New York at Albany, when they categorically denied that hormones influence human experience or behavior. These women attributed my respect for science to 'brainwashing' by men." Similar sorts of fights with feminists, lesbians, chauvinists, homophobes, and academics would continue for years, reaching a high point in an event in 1978 which led to her resignation from Bennington a year later.

In the early 1980s, Paglia finished her book but couldn't get published and was supporting herself with visiting and part-time teaching jobs at Yale, Wesleyan, and other Connecticut colleges. She taught night classes at the Sikorsky Helicopter plant. Her paper, "The Apollonian Androgyne and the Faerie Queen," was published in English Literary Renaissance, Winter 1979, and her dissertation was cited by J. Hillis Miller in his April 1980 article "Wuthering Heights Wuthering Heights

Wuthering Heights is Emily Bront [i]'s only novel [i]. ... 

 and the Ellipses of Interpretation," in Journal of Religion in Literature, but aside from that, not much was happening with her academic career at a time when her peers were moving on to important positions at major universities. In a letter of March 1993 to Boyd Holmes, she recalled: "I earned a little extra money by doing some local features reporting for a New Haven alternative newspaper in the early 1980s. There was an article on the historic pizzerias of the town and also one on an old house that was a stop on the Underground Railroad Underground Railroad

The Underground Railroad was a network of clandestine routes [i] by which African [i] slaves [i] ... 

."

She got a teaching job at the Philadelphia College of Performing Arts in 1984, which merged with its next-door neighbor, the Philadelphia College of Art, to become the University of the Arts in 1987. She took some time off to visit Europe, and while in Germany noted that "The women, stern-faced, melt the submissive heart...All look like Lotte Lenya Lotte Lenya

Lotte Lenya, singer and actress [i], born Karoline Wilhelmine Blamauer, in Vienna [i], Austria [i] ... 

!"

Works


Sexual Personae: The Androgyne in Literature and Art

This is the dissertation she presented to the Graduate School of Yale University in candidacy for her Ph.D in December 1974, and which formed the basis for her 1990 book by the same name. The 451 page study, broken up into four chapters, examined the appearance of sexually ambiguous figures in art and literature from classical antiquity to the modern period. She wrote that her thesis was based on the assumption that "the inner dynamic of all artistic creation is a psychic union between masculine and feminine powers." She described her method as interdisciplinary, as it combined "literary criticism, art history, and psychology in what I believe is a new synthesis."

Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson

The two-volume manuscript of Sexual Personae was completed in February 1981 and then rejected by seven publishers and five agents throughout the 1980s before its final acceptance by Ellen Graham for Yale University Press Yale University Press

Yale University Press is a book publisher [i] founded in 1908 [i]. ... 

 in 1985. For the next few years, she continued to teach while perfecting volume one of the book for its eventual publication in February 1990, and releasing a few additional portions of it in other journals and books.

Her paper "Oscar Wilde Oscar Wilde

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Anglo-Irish [i] playwright [i], novelist [i], poet [i]... 

 and the English Epicene" was published in 1988 in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest The Importance of Being Earnest

The Importance of Being Earnest is a classic comedy of manners [i] by Oscar Wilde [i]. ... 

, edited by Bloom; '"Sex and Violence, or Nature and Art", was published in 1988 in Western Humanities Review; and "Sex," was published in the Spenser Encyclopedia by A. C. Hamilton in 1989.

After the release of Sexual Personae on February 15, 1990, the book received little publicity from its publisher, as was typical of university presses at the time, but it sold well for months, prompting Yale University Press to send it into a second printing by November 1990. It was nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award that year, and then reprinted in paperback by Vintage Press in 1991. It became a best-seller, as did her subsequent books Sex, Art and American Culture: Essays and Vamps and Tramps .

In Sexual Personae, and in subsequent media statements and campus appearances throughout the early 1990s, Paglia aroused controversy by making statements against leaders of the American feminist movement, claiming they were ignorant of art, science, and history, that they were hostile to men, and doing harm to young women by teaching them to see themselves as nothing but victims. Her views on issues such as date rape, pornography, gay rights, and educational reform mostly angered people on the political left, who accused her of such things as misogyny, homophobia Homophobia

| |The of this article is . Please see the discussion on the Homophobia is the fear of, aversion... 

 and neoconservatism Neoconservatism

Neoconservatism is a political current and ideology, mainly in the United States [i], which is generally ... 

. A selection of her articles, lectures and other writings from this period appeared in her next book, Sex, Art, and American Culture.

Throughout the 1990s, she said that a second volume to Sexual Personae would be forthcoming, this volume was also to have included her thoughts on sports and popular culture. Eventually, she decided not to proceed with the book, as it would need to undergo so many revisions, reflecting her changing attitude towards popular culture.

Sex, Art, and American Culture

Whereas the 24 chapters of Sexual Personae looked at the study of decadence in art and culture from Egyptian history History of Egypt

The history of Egypt is the longest continuous history, as a unified state, of any country in the world.... 

 to the late 19th century 19th century

The 19th century lasted from 1801 [i] through 1900 [i] in the Gregorian calendar [i].
... 

, Sex, Art, and American Culture , exposed readers to Paglia's views on contemporary figures such as Madonna , Elizabeth Taylor Elizabeth Taylor

Dame Elizabeth Rosamund Taylor, DBE [i] is an iconic two-time Academy Award [i] ... 

, Robert Mapplethorpe Robert Mapplethorpe

Robert Mapplethorpe was an American [i] photographer, famous for his large-scale, highly-s ... 

, and Anita Hill Anita Hill

Anita F. Hill is a professor of social policy, law, and women's studies at Brandeis University [i] at t ... 

.

Two chapters of the book were devoted to date rape, which the author said contemporary feminists had been incapable of preventing. "Rape is an outrage that cannot be tolerated in civilized society," she wrote, "Yet feminism, which has waged a crusade for rape Rape

Rape is the act of forcing penetrative [i] sexual act [i]s, against another's will th ... 

 to be taken more seriously, has put young women in danger by hiding the truth about sex from them."

Her controversial piece on Madonna, which was originally published in the "New York Times" in 1990, would be the first of several articles, reviews and other commentary about her for years to come. Paglia captured Madonna's attention, but not in a positive way. When "Esquire" magazine and the HBO cable network tried to arrange for Paglia to interview her, Madonna refused. In 1996, Madonna told an interviewer in Brazil that "I think she was upset because I wouldn't do an interview with her... Unhappy people can be nasty people."

Vamps and Tramps

Her next book, also an essay collection, was titled Vamps and Tramps. This book collected all of her writings since her previous essay collection, and the critical response, which was mixed, tended to be that she had written too much on too wide a variety of topics. It included a theoretical manifesto about sex, "No Law in the Arena". It also included transcripts of her TV and film appearances of the previous years, including her 1993 collaboration with Glenn Belverio in his short film "Glennda and Camille Do Downtown," which played at the Sundance Film Festival Sundance Film Festival

The Sundance Film Festival is a film festival [i] in the United States [i], and ranks alongside the Cannes [i] ... 

 and won first prize for best short documentary at the Chicago Underground Film Festival.

The book was a bestseller and exposed a wide readership to her scathing views on contemporary matters such as feminism Feminism

Feminism is a diverse collection of social theories [i], political movement [i]s and moral philosophies [i] ... 

, academia, the Clinton Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton was the 42nd President of the United States [i], serving from 1993 to ... 

 presidency, the life of Jacqueline Kennedy Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis , known in the 1960s [i] as Jackie Kennedy, and later as... 

, and the career of Barbra Streisand Barbra Streisand

Barbara Joan Streisand is a two-time Academy Award [i]-winning American [i] ... 

. Paglia explains her title thusly:
"I want a revamped feminism. Putting the vamp back means the lady must be a tramp. My generation of Sixties rebels wanted to smash the bourgeois codes that had become the authoritarian totems of the Fifties. The 'nice' girl with her soft, sanitized speech and decorous manners had to go. Thirty years later, we're still stuck with her — in the official spokesmen and the anointed heiresses of the feminist establishment...Equal opportunity feminism, which I expouse, demands the removal of all barriers to woman's advance in the political and professional world — but not at the price of special protections for women which are infantilizing and anti-democratic."

The Birds

In 1998 her fourth book was published, its subject a single film: Alfred Hitchcock Alfred Hitchcock

Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE [i] was a highly influential director [i] ... 

's The Birds. She wrote it for the British Film Institute British Film Institute

The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter [i] to:
... 

's "Film Classics Series".

Basic Instinct commentary track

In 2001, Paglia recorded a commentary track for the DVD of one of her favorite films, Basic Instinct Basic Instinct

Basic Instinct is an American [i] erotic [i] mystery film [i] directed [i] ... 

. She speaks about the idea that society has destroyed the tension between the sexes, which Paglia says Basic Instinct captures perfectly. "Today, the ideal male is the gay man," she says, "and the ideal female is the worker female, the woman who can work in a coal mine just like all the other men."

In analyzing what she calls "the strange sexual world of Basic Inctinct" she notes that "Sharon Stone's performance as the vamp, Catherine Tramell, is in the mainline of femme fatale Femme fatale

A femme fatale is a stock character [i], usually a villain [i]ous woman [i], who deceptively mislead ... 

 portrayals in old Hollywood from Theda Bara Theda Bara

Theda Bara was the stage name of Theodosia Burr Goodman, a silent film [i] actress [i]. ... 

 and Marlene Dietrich Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich [IPA: marl?n? ditri] was an Academy Award [i]-nominated German-American [i] actress [i] ... 

 on." She praises almost everything about the film, even the credits and score, which she says are an "homage to Alfred Hitchcock, one of the master directors of the 20th century, and the one who first fused gory crime drama with scintillating, titillating, sexual intrigue and glamour." The lyrical music by Jerry Goldsmith Jerry Goldsmith

Jerrald King Goldsmith was a famous American [i] film score [i] composer [i] from Los Angeles, California [i]... 

 "seems to record mystery, ambiguity, sexual pursuit of female by male, and then the stalking of male by female."

Break, Blow, Burn

In 2005 her study of poetry, entitled Break, Blow, Burn: Camille Paglia Reads Forty-three of the World's Best Poems was published. The book contains full texts of the 43 poems, each followed by an essay. The title is from a line in "Holy Sonnet XIV" by John Donne John Donne

John Donne was a Jacobean [i] poet and preacher, the represen... 

. It was named as one of the "New York Times Notable Books of the Year" for 2005, and was on the bestseller's list for Amazon.com, Booksense, The New York Times, The Northern California Independent Booksellers Association", and Toronto Globe & Mail.

In this book, she wrote a chapter on each of the following poems:
  • William Shakespeare William Shakespeare

    William Shakespeare was an English [i] poet [i] and playwright [i] widely regarded as the great ... 

    , Sonnet 73
  • William Shakespeare, Sonnet 29
  • William Shakespeare, The Ghost's Speech from Hamlet Hamlet

    The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark is a tragedy [i] by William Shakespeare [i] and is one of h ... 

  • John Donne John Donne

    John Donne was a Jacobean [i] poet and preacher, the represen... 

    , The Flea
  • John Donne, Holy Sonnet I
  • John Donne, Holy Sonnet XIV
  • George Herbert George Herbert

    George Herbert was an English [i] poet [i], orator [i] and a priest [i]. ... 

    , Church-Monuments
  • George Herbert, The Quip
  • George Herbert, Love Love

    Love is a profound feeling [i] of tender affection [i] for or intense attraction [i] ... 

  • Andrew Marvell Andrew Marvell

    Andrew Marvell was an English [i] metaphysical poet [i], and the son of an Anglican [i] ... 

    , To His Coy Mistress
  • William Blake William Blake

    William Blake was an English poet [i], painter [i], and printmaker [i]. ... 

    , The Chimney Sweeper
  • William Blake, London London

    London is the capital [i] city of England [i] and of the United Kingdom [i]. ... 

  • William Wordsworth William Wordsworth

    William Wordsworth was a major English [i] romantic poet [i] who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge [i] ... 

    , The World Is Too Much With Us
  • William Wordsworth, Composed Upon Westminster Bridge
  • Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe Shelley

    Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English [i] Romantic poets [i] and is widely consider ... 

    , Ozymandias Ozymandias

    "Ozymandias" is a famous sonnet [i] by Percy Bysshe Shelley [i], published in 1818 [i]. ... 

  • Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge

    Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet [i], critic [i], and philosopher [i] who was, along with h ... 

    , Kubla Khan
  • Walt Whitman Walt Whitman

    Walter "Walt" Whitman is widely considered to be one of America's best and most influential poet [i]s.

... 

, Song Of Myself
  • Emily Dickinson Emily Dickinson

    Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was an American [i] poet [i]. ... 

    ,
    Because I Could Not Stop For Death
  • Emily Dickinson, Safe In Their Alabaster Chambers
  • Emily Dickinson, The Soul Selects Her Own Society
  • William Butler Yeats William Butler Yeats

    William Butler Yeats was an Anglo-Irish [i] poet [i], drama [i]tist, mystic [i] and public figure [i] ... 

    , The Second Coming
  • William Butler Yeats, Leda and the Swan Leda and the Swan

    The motif [i] of Leda and the Swan from Greek mythology [i], in which the Greek god [i] ... 

  • Wallace Stevens Wallace Stevens

    Wallace Stevens was a major American [i] Modernist [i] poet [i] whose work conta ... 

    ,
    Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock
  • Wallace Stevens, Anecdote of the Jar
  • William Carlos Williams William Carlos Williams

    Dr. William Carlos Williams , was an American poet [i] closely associated with Modernism [i] ... 

    ,
    The Red Wheelbarrow
  • William Carlos Williams, This Is Just To Say
  • Jean Toomer, Georgia Dusk
  • Langston Hughes Langston Hughes

    Langston Hughes was an American [i] poet [i], novel [i]ist, playwright [i], short story w ... 

    ,
    Jazzonia
  • Theodore Roethke, Cuttings
  • Theodore Roethke, Root Cellar
  • Theodore Roethke, The Visitant
  • Robert Lowell, Man and Wife
  • Sylvia Plath Sylvia Plath

    Sylvia Plath was an American [i] poet [i], novelist [i], short story [i] writer, and essay [i] ... 

    ,
    Daddy
  • Frank O'Hara, A Mexican Guitar
  • Paul Blackburn, The Once-Over
  • May Swenson, At East River
  • Gary Snyder Gary Snyder

    Gary Snyder is an American [i] poet [i], essayist, lecturer, and environmental activist [i]... 

    ,
    Old Pond
  • Norman H. Russell, The Tornado
  • Chuck Wachtel, A Paragraph
  • Rochell Kraut, My Makeup
  • Wanda Coleman, Wanda Why Aren't You Dead
  • Ralph Pomeroy, Corner Corner

    A corner is the place where two lines [i] of different dimensions meet at an angle [i], and a convex cor ... 

  • Joni Mitchell, Woodstock


While speaking at events during the 2006 promotional tour for the paperback version of her book, she attacked the positive reputations that poets John Ashberry John Ashbery

John Ashbery is an American [i] poet [i]. ... 

 and Jorie Graham have enjoyed in academe. Of Graham she said, "Maybe she had some talent early on... She is like a mirror to the professors; they look into her and see themselves."

She also spoke of how badly she felt for not including any poems by Allen Ginsberg Allen Ginsberg

Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American [i] Beat poet [i] born in Newark, New Jersey [i]. ... 

 in the book, since she was a fan of his since reading "Howl Howl

*Amnesia [i]
  • Archangel [i]
  • Bebop [i]

... 

". She said that she tried to excerpt the first hundred lines of "Howl", but that it gave the wrong impression of the work. The poem also did not entirely meet her standards. As she told a reporter for the "Toronto Star": "Howl, when I reread it, came across as so garish, stagey, hammy. It didn't work for this book."

She also considered including Ginsberg's "The Blue Angel" , which begins with the line, "Marlene Dietrich Marlene Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich [IPA: marl?n? ditri] was an Academy Award [i]-nominated German-American [i] actress [i] ... 

 is singing a lament for mechanical love."
As she said to the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco in 2006, it's "an early poem that was not well known," and is "oddly conventional in its format." She said "it's about Marlene Dietrich as a kind of automaton Automaton

An automaton is a self-operating machine.... 

, representing a robotic woman. And I thought this is really interesting, in sort of sexual terms about media, et cetera. But I refrained from doing it because I thought, well, people will just say I put it in because it's about a Hollywood star. And you know — probably I would, probably it's true! I mean, probably Marlene Dietrich means much more to me than it would to the general readership."

Another Ginsberg poem she said she admires is "America" . In 2005 she told an audience in San Francisco's Haight Ashbury Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco, California

The Haight-Ashbury is a district of San Francisco [i], California [i], USA [i] ... 

 district that this poem, which includes the line "I'm addressing you. Are you going to let your emotional life be run by Time Magazine Time (magazine)

Time is a weekly American [i] newsmagazine [i], similar to Newsweek [i] and U.S. News & World Report [i] ... 

?"
is a rare example of quality writing about the media, which goes "from Ginsberg to Chuck Wachtel with a lot of crap in between." Her reference to Chuck Wachtel specifically concerned his poem "A Paragraph", which is featured in Break, Blow, Burn. Ginsburg's "A Supermarket in California" was also considered too long for inclusion.

She wanted to include a poem by a friend of hers from Yale, Mark Strand, but she decided that her selection simply did not belong in a book that included Yeats's "The Second Coming."

Influences on Paglia's work

Scholars, critics and other writers whose work has strongly influenced Paglia's thought include:
  • Gaston Bachelard
  • Simone de Beauvoir Simone de Beauvoir

    Simone de Beauvoir was a French [i] author [i] and philosopher [i]. ... 

  • Harold Bloom Harold Bloom

    Harold Bloom, Ph.D. [i], is an American [i] professor [i] and promine ... 

  • Brigid Brophy
  • Norman O. Brown
  • Kenneth Clark Kenneth Clark

    Kenneth McKenzie Clark, Baron Clark of Saltwood, OM [i] CH [i] KCB [i] ... 

  • Samuel Taylor Coleridge Samuel Taylor Coleridge

    Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet [i], critic [i], and philosopher [i] who was, along with h ... 

  • Patrick Dennis
  • Emile Durkheim Émile Durkheim

    mile Durkheim was a french [i] sociologist [i], considered by many to be the father of modern so ... 

  • Sandor Ferenczi Sándor Ferenczi

    Sndor Ferenczi was a Hungarian psychoanalyst [i].

... 



... 



The name Freud is generally pronounced [i] [] in English [i] and [] in German [i] ... 


  • Allen Ginsburg Allen Ginsberg

    Irwin Allen Ginsberg was an American [i] Beat poet [i] born in Newark, New Jersey [i]. ... 

  • Erving Goffman
  • Germaine Greer Germaine Greer

    Germaine Greer is an Australian [i] academic, writer, and broadcaster, who is widely regarded ... 

  • Jane Ellen Harrison Jane Ellen Harrison

    Jane Ellen Harrison was a ground-breaking British [i] classical [i] ... 

  • Carl Jung Carl Jung

    Carl Gustav Jung was a Swiss [i] psychiatrist [i] and founder of analytical psychology [i]. ... 

  • G. Wilson Knight
  • Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing

    Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing was an Austro-German psychiatrist [i] who wrote Psychopathia Sexualis [i] ... 

  • D. H. Lawrence D. H. Lawrence

    David Herbert Lawrence was an important and controversial English [i] writer of the 20th century [i] ... 

  • Mary McCarthy
  • Marshall McLuhan Marshall McLuhan

    Herbert Marshall McLuhan CC [i] was a Canadian [i] educator [i], philosopher [i] ... 

  • Erich Neumann
  • Friedrich Nietzsche Friedrich Nietzsche

    Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche , a Prussia [i]n-born philologist [i] and philosopher [i], produced critique ... 

  • Dorothy Parker Dorothy Parker

    Dorothy Parker was an American [i] writer [i] and poet [i], best known for her caustic wit [i] ... 

  • Walter Pater Walter Pater

    [i]

... 


  • Plutarch Plutarch

    Mestrius Plutarchus , known in English as Plutarch, was a Greek [i] historian [i], ... 

  • Denis de Rougemont
  • Marquis de Sade Marquis de Sade

    Donatien Alphonse Franois, [le] Marquis de Sade was a French [i] aristocrat and writer of philosophy [i] ... 

  • Susan Sontag Susan Sontag

    Susan Sontag was a well-known American [i] essay [i]ist, novel [i]ist, intellectual [i], filmmaker [i] ... 

  • Oswald Spengler Oswald Spengler

    Oswald Arnold Gottfried Spengler was a German historian [i] and philosopher [i] whose interests also in ... 

  • Rod Serling Rod Serling

    Rodman "Rod" Edward Serling was an American [i] screenwriter [i], most famous for his science fiction [i] ... 

  • Parker Tyler
  • Oscar Wilde Oscar Wilde

    Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Anglo-Irish [i] playwright [i], novelist [i], poet [i]... 

  • Virginia Woolf Virginia Woolf

    Virginia Woolf is by reputation one of the foremost modernist [i] literary [i] ... 



Criticism of Paglia

Paglia has over the years been a controversial figure and attracted most of her media exposure through public rows with, amongst others, The Modern Review and an early exit from an ITV News ITV News

ITV News is the news service of British TV channel ITV1 [i]. ... 

 interview.

References and footnotes


Bibliography

  • Sexual Personae: The Androgyne in Literature and Art
  • Sexual Personae: Art and Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson
  • Sex, Art and American Culture: Essays
  • Vamps and Tramps: New Essays ISBN 0-679-75120-3
  • The Birds 
  • Break, Blow, Burn: Camille Paglia Reads Forty-three of the World's Best Poems ISBN 0-375-42084-3

News articles


Articles by Paglia

  • article by Paglia
  • article by Paglia
  • article by Paglia