Venus in Furs
Encyclopedia
Novella
A novella is a written, fictional, prose narrative usually longer than a novelette but shorter than a novel. The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Nebula Awards for science fiction define the novella as having a word count between 17,500 and 40,000...
by Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n author Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
Leopold Ritter von Sacher-Masoch was an Austrian writer and journalist, who gained renown for his romantic stories of Galician life. The term masochism is derived from his name....
, the best known of his works. The novel was part of an epic series that Sacher-Masoch envisioned called Legacy of Cain
Legacy of Cain
The Legacy of Cain is an unfinished cycle of novellas by the 19th century Austrian author Leopold von Sacher-Masoch. His original plan was to group various novellas into 6 volumes, each of which was titled according to its central theme; those are "Love", "Property", "State", "War", "Work", and...
. Venus in Furs was part of Love, the first volume of the series. It was published in 1870.
Novel
The novel draws themes and character inspiration heavily from Sacher-Masoch’s own life. Wanda von Dunajew (the novel's central female character) was modelled after Fanny Pistor, who was an emerging literary writer. The two met when Pistor contacted Sacher-Masoch, under the fictitious title of a noble Baroness Bogdanoff, for suggestions on improvement of her works, to make them suitable for publication.Plot summary
The framing story concerns a man who dreams of speaking to VenusVenus (mythology)
Venus is a Roman goddess principally associated with love, beauty, sex,sexual seduction and fertility, who played a key role in many Roman religious festivals and myths...
about love while she wears furs. The unnamed narrator tells his dreams to a friend, Severin, who tells him how to break him of his fascination with cruel women by reading a manuscript, Memoirs of a Suprasensual Man.
This manuscript tells of a man, Severin von Kusiemski, so infatuated with a woman, Wanda von Dunajew, that he requests to be treated as her slave, and encourages her to treat him in progressively more degrading ways. At first Wanda does not understand or relate to the request, but after humouring Severin a bit she finds the advantages of the method to be interesting and enthusiastically embraces the idea; though at the same time, she disdains Severin for allowing her to do so.
Severin describes his feelings during these experiences as suprasensuality. Severin and Wanda travel to Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. Along the way, Severin takes the generic Russian servant's name of "Gregor" and the role of Wanda's servant. In Florence, Wanda treats him brutally as a servant, and recruits a trio of Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
n women to dominate him.
The relationship arrives at a crisis point when Wanda herself meets a man to whom she would like to submit, a Byronic hero
Byronic hero
The Byronic hero is an idealised but flawed character exemplified in the life and writings of English Romantic poet Lord Byron. It was characterised by Lady Caroline Lamb, later a lover of Byron's, as being "mad, bad, and dangerous to know"...
known as Alexis Papadopolis. At the end of the book, Severin, humiliated by Wanda's new lover, loses the desire to submit. He says of Wanda:
"That woman, as nature has created her, and man at present is educating her, is man's enemy. She can only be his slave or his despot, but never his companion. This she can become only when she has the same rights as he and is his equal in education and work."
In popular culture
- The novel has been adapted for film five times: in 1967, twice in 1969 (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064626/ and http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064789/), in 1985 (Verfuehrung: Die Grausame Frau, a lesbian-feminist interpretation directed by Monika Treut http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090252/), and in 1994. The 1994 film was directed by Maartje Seyferth and Victor E. Nieuwenhuijs (http://www.moskitofilm.nl/?page_id=6), and received an award at the 1994 international film festival of Saint PetersburgSaint PetersburgSaint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
, RussiaRussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
.
- In 1967 The Velvet UndergroundThe Velvet UndergroundThe Velvet Underground was an American rock band formed in New York City. First active from 1964 to 1973, their best-known members were Lou Reed and John Cale, who both went on to find success as solo artists. Although experiencing little commercial success while together, the band is often cited...
's debut album included the song "Venus in FursVenus in Furs (song)"Venus in Furs" is a song by The Velvet Underground, written by Lou Reed and originally released on the 1967 album The Velvet Underground & Nico. Inspired by the book of the same name by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the song includes sexual themes of sadomasochism, bondage and...
." It became one of the group's most famous recordings, and the many bands who have since used "venus in furs" as a name or lyrical allusion are more likely to have been influenced by the song than to have read the book.
- The book inspired Venus in FurVenus in FurVenus in Fur is a two-person play set in the modern day by David Ives, which had its première at the Classic Stage Company Off Broadway in New York City in 2010, and on Broadway in 2011.-Productions:...
, a 2010 play set in the modern day by David IvesDavid IvesDavid Ives is a contemporary American playwright. A native of South Chicago, Ives attended a minor Catholic seminary and Northwestern University and, after some years' interval, Yale School of Drama, where he received an MFA in playwriting...
, which had its premier at the Classic Stage CompanyClassic Stage CompanyClassic Stage Company, or CSC, is a classical Off-Broadway theater dedicated to reimagining the classical repertory for a contemporary American audience, presenting plays from the past that speak directly to today's issues. Founded in 1967, Classic Stage Company is one of Off-Broadway's...
Off Broadway in New York City starring Nina AriandaNina AriandaNina Arianda is an American theatre and film actress.-Early life and education:Arianda grew up in Clifton, New Jersey and Heidelberg, Germany...
and Wes BentleyWes BentleyWesley Cook "Wes" Bentley is an American film actor known for his role of Ricky Fitts in American Beauty.-Early life:Bentley was born in Jonesboro, Arkansas, the son of Cherie and David Bentley, who are United Methodist ministers....
.
See also
- DominatrixDominatrixDominatrix or mistress is a woman or women who takes the dominant role in bondage, discipline and sadomasochism, or BDSM. A common form of address for a submissive to a dominatrix is "mistress", "ma'am", "domina" or "maîtresse"...
- Femdom
- Sadomasochism
- SensoSenso (book)Senso is an Italian novella by Camillo Boito, a famous Italian author and architect. He wrote it around 1882. The novella develops a disturbing account of indiscriminate indulgence in selfish sensuality. The word "senso" is Italian for "sense," "feeling," or "sentiment." The title refers to the...
, an 1882 novella by Camillo BoitoCamillo BoitoCamillo Boito was an Italian architect and engineer, and a noted art critic, art historian and novelist.-Biography:...
, which serves as a sort of the gender reversal on the same themes as Venus in Furs. - Venus in Furs (1969 film)Venus in Furs (1969 film)Venus in Furs is a 1969 Italian supernatural erotic thriller film directed by Jesús Franco and starring James Darren.The film bears only a superficial resemblance to the 1870 Venus in Furs novel by Leopold von Sacher Masoch...
External links
- The complete text of Venus in Furs from Project GutenbergProject GutenbergProject Gutenberg is a volunteer effort to digitize and archive cultural works, to "encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks". Founded in 1971 by Michael S. Hart, it is the oldest digital library. Most of the items in its collection are the full texts of public domain books...