The collection of short stories that makes up this anthology was written during the 1940s for a private client known simply as "Collector". This "Collector" commissioned Nin, along with other now well-known writers (including Henry Miller and the poet George Barker), to produce erotic fiction for his private consumption. [3] His identity has since been revealed as Roy M. Johnson (1881–1960), a wealthy American businessman from Ardmore, Oklahoma, who had discovered the Healdton Oil Pool. [4] While using the Kama Sutra and other writings such as those of Krafft-Ebing as models, Nin was very conscious that the languages of male and female sexuality were distinct. [6] Although at times she scorned her erotica, and feared for their impact on her literary reputation, [7] they have subsequently been seen by sex-positive feminists as pioneering work. [8] Short stories [ edit ] Andrew Gibson, Postmodernity, Ethics and the Novel: from Leavis to Levinas, Routledge, 1999, ISBN 0-415-19895-X, p.177 Set in Paris, France, in 1940 in the early days of World War II before the German invasion and conquest of France, Elena Martin ( Audie England) is a young American writer struggling to get by in Paris while searching for inspiration for her first novel. Elena meets and has a sordid affair with a fellow American expatriate named Lawrence Walters ( Costas Mandylor). With some encouragement from her friends, her lover, and her publisher, Elena gets involved in nude modeling and progresses onward through many other forms of voyeuristic and participatory sexual adventures as she further researches for inspiration to write her book and become an author of erotic fiction. If you nourished your sexual life with all the excitements and adventures which love injects into sensuality, you would be the most potent man in the world. The source of sexual power is curiosity, passion. You are watching its little flame die of asphyxiation. Sex does not thrive on monotony. Without feeling, inventions, moods, no surprises in bed. Sex must be mixed with

becomes a mechanistic obsession. It becomes a bore. You have taught us more than anyone I know how wrong it is not to mix it with emotion, hunger, desire, lust, whims, caprices, personal ties, deeper relationships that change its color, flavor, rhythms, intensities.In 2021, the pornographic film studio Thousand Faces released a short film called Mathilde based on Nin's story of the same name from Delta of Venus. [9] See also [ edit ] You do not know what you are missing by your micro-scopic examination of sexual activity to the exclusion of aspects which are the fuel that ignites it. Intellectual, imaginative, romantic, emotional. This is what gives sex its surprising textures, its subtle transformations, its aphrodisiac elements. You are shrinking your world of sensations. You are withering it, starving it, draining its blood.

Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2023-06-23 . Retrieved 2023-06-14. {{ cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title ( link) Bettie's most fruitful partnership came with bondage photographer Irving Klaw, who created custom photosets and film reels for clients based around the (now well-established) BDSM tropes: spanking, catfights, leather boots & fishnets, riding crops, etc. Interestingly though she was in-demand for that sort of material, Bettie never had any interest in bondage in her personal life – she considered it harmless, if a bit silly. I think that's part of her stuff's allure, aside from being ravishingly beautiful there was always an aura of carefree & fun coming through in her photos.French-born novelist, passionate eroticist and short story writer, who gained international fame with her journals. Spanning the years from 1931 to 1974, they give an account of one woman's voyage of self-discovery. "It's all right for a woman to be, above all, human. I am a woman first of all." (from The Diary of Anaïs Nin, vol. I, 1966)

Platinum-haired and with an unmistakable charisma & camera presence, Seka is one of the most recognizable adult actresses of the 1970s. Delta of Venus is a book of fifteen short stories by Anaïs Nin published posthumously in 1977 [1]—though largely written in the 1940s as erotica for a private collector. [2] Anaïs Nin was largely ignored until the 1960s. Today she is regarded as one of the leading female writers of the 20th century and a source of inspiration for women challenging conventionally defined gender roles. French-born novelist, passionate eroticist and short story writer, who gained international fame with her journals. Spanning the years from 1931 to 1974, they give an account of one woman's voyage of self-discovery. "It's all right for a woman to be, above all, human. I am a woman first of all." (from The Diary of Anaïs Nin, vol. I, 1966) The book, unlike the later Little Birds, contains no poetry as such. Its introductory preface contains entries from her Diary, which expressed her hope that its unexpurgated version would one day be published. If you enjoyed Delta of Venus, you might like Stephen Vizinczey's In Praise of Older Women, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.As influential and revelatory in its day as Fifty Shades of Grey is now, Anaïs Nin's Delta of Venus is a groundbreaking anthology of erotic short stories, published in Penguin Modern Classics