by Ray Furness
Sacher-Masoch: Venus in Furs
In the middle of the night there was a knock at my window. I got up, opened it and started back – it was Venus in Furs, just as she had first appeared before me.
‘Your stories have excited me, I’ve been tossing and turning and can’t get to sleep’ she said. ‘Come and keep me company.’
‘Wait a moment.’
When I entered her room I saw Wanda crouching before the hearth; a small fire was burning.
‘Autumn is coming’ she announced, ‘the nights are already quite cool. I don’t wish to displease you but I can’t take off these furs until the room is warm enough.’
‘Displease me! You minx! You know perfectly well – put my arms around her and kissed her.
‘Of course I know it – but how did you get this obsession with fur?’
‘I was born with it,’ I replied. ‘I’ve had it since childhood. As a matter of fact, fur has an unsettling effect on all overwrought individuals, and this is caused by universal, natural laws. It’s a physical effect, at least it’s strangely tingling, and nobody can quite resist it. Science has recently discovered a certain affinity between heat and electricity – at least they have a similar effect upon the human organism. The earth’s torrid zones produce people who are more passionate, and a warm atmosphere produces excitement. It is the same with electricity. That’s why we get the bewitchingly beneficial influence that cats make upon excitable, intellectual individuals, and that’s what makes these long-tailed darlings of the animal world, these graceful iridescent electric batteries, the favourites of people such as Mahomet, Cardinal Richelieu, Crebillon, Rousseau and Wieland.’
‘So,’ Wanda cried, ‘a woman in furs is nothing more than a large cat, a charged electric battery?’
‘Of course,’ I replied, ‘and this is how I explain the symbolic power that fur has gained as an attribute of power and beauty. Kings looked to fur for this in earlier times; a ruling aristocracy insisted on fur in their sartorial requirements, as did great painters when they portrayed the queens of beauty. For the divine form of his Fornarina Raphael could find no more precious frame than dark fur, as could Titian when he painted the rosy flesh of his mistress.’
‘I am most grateful for this learned erotic disquisition,’ Wanda said, ‘but you haven’t told me everything. You associate fur with something quite distinctive.’
‘Certainly,’ I cried. ‘I keep telling you that I find a strange excitement in pain, that nothing can whip up my passions more than tyranny and cruelty, especially the perfidy of a beautiful woman. And I can only conceive of this woman, this strange ideal from the aesthetics of baseness, this soul of a Nero in the body of a Phryne, as being draped in furs.’
‘I know,’ Wanda interceded ‘it gives a woman something imperious, impressive.’
‘It isn’t only that,’ I continued. ‘You know that I am a supersensory being, that for me everything is rooted in the imagination and draws it nourishment from this source. I was a precocious child and extremely excitable, and when I was about ten years old I came across a book on the legends of the martyrs. I can remember the mixture of horror and ecstasy with which I read how they rotted in prisons, were laid upon the grill, were transfixed with arrows, boiled in oil, thrown to wild animals, were crucified and suffered the most appalling agonies with a kind of joy. From that time onwards I regarded suffering and torment as a kind of pleasure, and it had to be a torment imposed by a beautiful woman, because for me everything poetic, everything demonic, is concentrated in woman. I made a cult of this.
In sensuality I saw something holy, indeed, only holiness; I saw something divine in woman and her beauty because life’s most important goal – reproduction – is her prime task. I saw in woman the personification of nature, of Isis, and man was her priest, her slave; she confronted him as cruel as nature which thrusts away that which has served her as soon as she no longer needs it – whilst for him mistreatment, even death through her is the most voluptuous bliss.
I envied King Gunter who was tied up by the powerful Brunhilde on their wedding night; I envied the poor minstrel who was sewn up into a wolf’s skin by his moody mistress who then hunted him like a wild animal; I envied the Knight Ctirad whom the bold amazon Scharka captured through cunning in a forest near Prague: she dragged him to her castle at Divin and, after she had toyed with him for a while she bound him on the wheel and –’
‘Monstrous!’ Wanda cried. ‘I could wish that you had fallen into the hands of such a wild woman, sewn into your wolf-skin, and, I tell you, you would soon forget your poetry beneath the teeth of her wild dogs, or on the wheel.’
‘Do you think so? I don’t.’
‘I don’t think you’re being particularly clever.’
‘Perhaps not. But listen: from that time onwards I used to read insatiably stories which portrayed the most dreadful cruelties, and I especially liked to look at pictures or prints where these were portrayed – all the bloodiest tyrants who ever sat on a throne, the inquisitors who tortured heretics by roasting or beheading, all those women who have gone down in history as voluptuous, beautiful and violent, like Libussa, Lucrezia Borgia, Anne of Hungary, Queen Margot, Isabeau, the Sultana Roxalane, the Russian tsarinas of the last century – and I saw them all in furs or robes lined with ermine.’
‘And so this fur is beginning to inspire your extraordinary imagination,’ Wanda cried, and began to drape herself coquettishly with her fur coat so that the darkly gleaming sable played charmingly about her arms and breasts. ‘Now – how do you feel about this? Are you on the rack already?’
Her green piercing eyes were fixed on me with a strange, scornful ease; overwhelmed by passion I threw myself before her and flung my arms around her.
‘Yes … you have aroused in me my favourite fantasies, longings which have lain dormant for years.’
‘And what are these?’ she asked, placing her hand upon my neck.
I was seized, beneath this little warm hand, beneath her gaze which questioned, beneath those half closed lids, with a sweet intoxication.
‘To be the slave of a woman, a beautiful woman, one whom I love and worship!’
‘And one who ill-treats you for it!’ Wanda interrupted me, laughing.
‘Yes, one who binds me and whips me, one who kicks me whilst belonging to another.’
‘And one who, when you are insane with jealousy, will go to your happy rival and go so far as to present you to him and give you over to his crudeness, his brutality. Why not? Do you like my final picture?’
I looked at Wanda, terrified.
‘It exceeds my wildest dreams!’
‘Yes, we women are resourceful’ she said. ‘Be careful when you have found your ideal, as it can easily happen that she will treat you more cruelly than is good for you.’
‘I fear that I have found my ideal already!’ I cried, and pressed my glowing face into her lap.
‘But you don’t mean me, do you?’ Wanda cried, throwing off her furs and dancing about the room. She was still laughing as I went downstairs, and when I was standing in the courtyard, deep in thought, I could hear that wilful, malicious laughter still.
* * * *
‘Am I really to incorporate your ideal?’ Wanda asked roguishly when we met in the park.
I could not answer at first. The most contrary of sensations raged within me. She had sat down upon a stone bench and was playing with a flower.
‘Well … am I?’
I knelt and seized her hands.
‘I beg you once more – be my wife, my faithful, honourable wife; if you cannot do this, then be my ideal, but completely without reservation, without mitigation.’
‘You know that I will give you my hand after a year if you are the man I am looking for,’ said Wanda, very seriously. ‘But I think you would be more grateful to me if I were to realise your fantasies. So, which do you prefer?’
‘I think that everything in my imagination lies in your nature.’
&
nbsp; ‘You are wrong.’
‘I think,’ I continued ‘that it gives you pleasure to have a man completely in your power, to torment him –.’
‘No, no!’ she cried, agitated. ‘And yet …’ She paused. ‘I don’t understand myself any more. I must make a confession to you. You have corrupted my imagination and heated my blood, I’m now starting to find pleasure in it all … The animation with which you’ve been speaking about Mme de Pompadour, about Catherine the Second and all the other frivolous, cruel, self-indulgent women has captivated me, overwhelmed me and makes me want to be like these women who were slavishly idolised throughout their lives and would perform miracles, even in the grave. And now you’ve made me a miniature despot, a Mme de Pompadour for domestic use.’
‘Well,’ I said, excited, ‘if that’s what you’re capable of, then give in to it, let nature take its course, but don’t be half-hearted about it: if you can’t be a good, faithful wife, then be a devil!’
I was excitable, overwrought, and the nearness of this beautiful woman made me feverish. I don’t remember what I was talking about, I only remember kissing her feet – and then I picked up one of them and placed it on my neck. But she swiftly and angrily drew it back, and rose to her feet. ‘If you love me, Severin,’ she said quickly, and her voice sounded sharp, peremptory – ‘if you love me, then do not speak of such things again. Do you understand me? Never. Or I might –’ She smiled and sat down again.
‘I am absolutely serious,’ I cried, almost hallucinating. ‘I adore you so much that I would suffer everything at you hands for the sake of spending my whole life at your side.’
‘Severin, I warn you once more.’
‘Your warning is in vain. Do whatever you want with me, but don’t push me away completely.’
‘Severin,’ Wanda replied. ‘I am a frivolous young woman and it’s dangerous for you to give yourself to me completely. You will finally become my plaything and who would protect you if I abuse your insane ideas?’
‘Your nobility would.’
‘Power makes us arrogant.’
‘Be arrogant, then!’ I cried, ‘Kick me!’
Wanda folded her arms above my neck, gazed into my eyes and shook her head. ‘I fear I may not be able to do it, but I’ll try, for your sake, for I love you Severin more than I have ever loved a man before.’
* * * *
Today she suddenly took up her hat and scarf and bade me follow her to the market. She inspected a selection of whips, long whips on a short handle, used in dog training.
‘These should do,’ said the vendor.
‘No, they’re much too small,’ said Wanda, casting a sideways glance in my direction. ‘I need a big one.’
‘Perhaps for a bulldog?’
‘Yes,’ she said, ‘the sort they have in Russia for recalcitrant slaves.’
She looked at what was on offer and finally chose a whip which made me feel rather uncomfortable.
‘Well, adieu Severin,’ she said, ‘I’ve got to make certain purchases where you may not accompany me.’
I took my leave and went for a walk; on the way back I saw Wands coming out of a furrier’s shop. She called me to her.
‘Consider this,’ she said contentedly. ‘I’ve never made a secret out of the fact that it was your deep, contemplative nature that captivated me so; it now appeals to me to see this earnest suitor completely in my power, writhing in ecstasy at my feet, but how long will this last? A woman loves a man; she ill-treats her slave and finally kicks him away with her foot.’
‘Well, kick me away with you foot when you have tired of me,’ I responded. ‘I want to be your slave.’
‘I see that there are dangerous tendencies within me,’ said Wanda after we had walked a few paces. ‘You have awakened them, and it will not be to your advantage. You understand how to awaken hedonism and cruelty; you portray pride in such glowing colours … What would you say if I embarked on this and if I started on you, like Dionys who roasted the inventor of the Iron Ox in his own creation to find out whether his roaring and his death-rattle really did sound like the lowing of an ox. Perhaps I’m a female Dionys?’
‘Be it so!’ I cried. ‘Then my imaginings will have come true! I belong to you, for good or ill – you must chose. The destiny within my breast drives me onwards, demon-like, over-powering …’
* * * *
‘My dear Severin,
I do not wish to see you today, nor tomorrow, and only in the evening of the day after that – and then as my slave.
Your mistress,
Wanda.’
‘As my slave,’ was underlined. I read the note again (it had come early in the morning), I had a donkey saddled and rode into the mountains in order to still my passion, my longing, in the splendours of the Carpathians.
Then I returned, hungry, tired, thirsty, and above all infatuated. I quickly got changed, and a few minutes later was knocking on her door.
‘Enter!’
I went in. She was standing in the middle of the room, dressed in a white satin gown which flowed across her body like light, and a scarlet satin jacket with a rich trimming of ermine; in her powdered, snowy hair a small diamond tiara was sparkling. Her arms were crossed upon her breast, her brows were knitted.
‘Wanda!’ I ran towards her, about to embrace her and kiss her, but she stepped backwards, and her glance measured me from head to foot.
‘Slave!’
‘Mistress!’ I knelt and kissed the edge of her robe.
‘That is correct.’
‘How lovely you are!’
‘Do I please you?’ She walked up to the mirror and gazed at her reflection with haughty approval.
‘I shall go mad!’
Her bottom lip twitched scornfully and she looked at me mockingly between half-closed eyes.
‘Give me the whip.’
I looked about the room.
‘No, remain kneeling.’ She strode to the hearth, took the whip from the mantelpiece and let it whistle through the air, smiling at me. Then she slowly rolled back the sleeve of her fur jacket.
‘Wondrous woman!’ I cried.
‘Silence, slave!’ She suddenly glowered at me, wildly, and struck me with the whip: but in the next moment she had put her arm tenderly about my neck and bent down towards me, in pity. ‘Did I hurt you?’ she asked, half-ashamed, half-frightened.
‘No!’ I replied,’ and even if you did, the pain that you give me is purest joy. Whip me if it gives you pleasure.’
‘But it doesn’t give me pleasure.’
And again that strange intoxication seized me.
‘Whip me!’ I begged. ‘Whip me without mercy.’
Wanda cracked the whip and struck me a second time. ‘Have you had enough?’
‘No!’
‘Are you serious? No?’
‘Beat me, please, it gives me such pleasure.’
‘Yes, because you know it isn’t serious,’ she replied, ‘that I haven’t the heart to hurt you. This whole crude game offends me. If I were really a woman who beat her slaves, then you would be horrified!’
‘No, Wanda,’ I said, ‘I love you more than I do myself, I am devoted to you, in life and death, you can do whatever you want with me, whatever your pride dictates.’
‘Severin!’
‘Kick me with your feet!’ I cried and threw myself before her, my face close to the floor.
‘I hate all these charades,’ Wanda said impatiently.
‘So, mistreat me in earnest.’
A sinister pause.
‘Severin, I give you one last warning –’
‘If you love me, be cruel to me,’ I implored, lifting my eyes to her.
‘If I love you?’ she repeated. ‘Very well!’ She stepped back and gazed at me, smiling darkly. ‘So be my slave, and know what it is to fall into the hands of a woman!’ And at that moment she kicked me.
‘How does that suit you, slave?’ She swung the whip. ‘Get up!’
I was abo
ut to rise. ‘No,’ she commanded. ‘On to your knees!’
I obeyed, and she started whipping me.
The lashes fell, strong and swift, upon my back and my arms, each one cut, burning, into my flesh, but the pain ravished me and I felt an ecstasy that they had come from her, the one whom I adored and for whom I was ready to lose my life at any moment.
Now she stopped. ‘I am beginning to find this agreeable,’ she said, ‘but it is enough for one day. I am seized by a devilish curiosity to see how far your strength will last, and by a cruel delight in seeing you tremble beneath my whip, hearing your cries, your groans, until you beg for mercy, and I whip you mercilessly until you lose your senses. You have awoken dangerous tendencies within me. Now get up.’
I seized her hand and tried to press my lips against it.
‘What insolence!’
She kicked me away with her foot.
‘Out of my sight, slave!’
[…]
It is evening. A pretty young maid orders me to appear before my Mistress. I climb up the wide marble steps, go through the vestibule – a large salon, decorated with sumptuous and lavish splendour – and knock at the door of the bedroom. I knock very gently, intimidated by the luxury that surrounds me, and she does not hear me, so I stand for a few minutes outside the door. It seemed as though I were standing before the bedchamber of the great Catherine, as though she would appear at any moment in a green fur négligée, a red medallion on her naked breasts and white, powdered ringlets.
I knocked again. Wanda opened the door impatiently.
‘Why so late?’ she asked.
