As a part of our required reading for Forbidden texts, we had to read 120 Days of Sodom. This is my overall review of the book and what parts stuck out to me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Introduction<\/strong>: The original scroll was kept in a copper cylinder, hidden in the wall of de Sades prison cell. He was transfered to the outskirts of Paris and had to leave all of his belongings, including his novel, which sat in the walls for 11 days. His wife was to come by and collect his items but the Revolution beat her to it. This brought Marquis great pain, saying he wept tears of blood. I wanted to see if there was an explanation for this saying but not much came up so we’re left to only assume. My guess would be he was brought so much pain from losing his work, he “wept tears of blood.” It is said that the scroll was found by a man, who sold it to an aristocrat, or someone who was born into a higher status. This family kept it for over 3 generations, which they later sold it to a German collector. A sexoligist was granted access and he later published a subscription edition in Berlin, saying it was a great work of sexology. I wouldn’t necessarily say this book was a great piece of work, but from a sexoligist point of view, I could see how this could expand the field of work. I think the novel is a great way to study someone and how they think sexually. The novel was later reacquired by late descendents of De Sade and brought back to France. It went back and forth across borders a couple times but was bought by France in 2021 for \u20ac4.55 million with sponsership from a library in Paris.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Marquis’s relationship with Madame de Sade is very concerning. She warns him many times that his writings are causing him to look bad. He constantly demands items from her, claiming he “was made to be served, and served I shall be.” He sent her to buy luxurious goods, food, and sex items. He always demanded the latest plays, novels and newspapers. In some of the letters sent to his wife, he sends death threats to her, but also defends his actions towards the women he’s abused. He then signs the letter in blood, which I find very disturbing. Marquis suffered health issues in prison as well as his mental health deteriorating. He claimed prison made him even crazier. After the Revolution, de Sade was released but his wife refused to see him and ultimately divorced him. He took the job as a playwright at a theatre. He joined a radical group and was elected president, which gave him status to vote on the death penalty who went against the Revolution. He saved his former parent-in-laws, but then later he was accused of being an enemy of the Revolution. He escaped his sentenced death but because of his published works, he was incarcerated at an insane asylum. He spent the rest of his life there and would be allowed to organize the asylum’s theatrical works. Marquis de Sade died in early December of 1814. He requested to be buried in the woods of his property, but was brought with a Christian burial instead. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The<\/strong> 120 Days of Sodom<\/strong>: This book seriously disturbed me. There’s just so much to take in and understand. I had a very hard time getting through this book, as I’d say any decent human being would. The sexual torture and murder in this book are just so graphic, and not just that but the DETAILS. There were a couple of times throughout this book that brought me to tears, made me have to step away from it to collect my thoughts, and want to throw up. To think that an actual human sat there in his thoughts and really felt this way and decided to put it into words, it’s terrifying. <\/p>\n\n\n\n I should also include in my review that I also was interested in this book in a psychological way. By no means was I interested in it because of the details, but more what it said about de Sade as a person. I truly believe he was an evil person and it was for the good of society that he was locked away for a large portion of his life. From the introduction of the book, we get a look at what his childhood and adolescence were like and let’s just say, it was something. It really does explain a lot about him though and possibly why he is the way he is. It also makes you question whether this book was real or simply just the imagination of de Sade. He goes into great detail about sexual debauchery, torture, and murder that occurred in this secluded castle. Were these just simply his gruesome fantasies or was this something he was involved in? For the sake of the victims, I hope this was just some sick fantasy, but since de Sade never got to finish the novel, we will never know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As a part of our required reading for Forbidden texts, we had to read 120 Days of Sodom. This is my overall review of the book and what parts stuck out to me. Introduction: The original scroll was kept in a copper cylinder, hidden in the wall of de Sades prison cell. He was transfered…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fsem-readings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35\/revisions\/41"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forbiddentexts.victoriahunsaker.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}