We no longer have the internet in my apartment. For some reason the two people we were stealing it from decided to secure their connections. I know I have no right to be mad about this, but I am. Especially since we do not have a TV. As a result I have been reading a lot and thinking too much.
Last weekend I read Bad Behavior by Mary Gaitskill. It was amazing and I finished it in a day and a half. For those of you who aren't familiar, Mary Gaitskill writes a lot of stories about fucked up women, many of whom are prostitutes and/or into S&M. Finishing it inspired me to read Venus in Furs by Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch. It was published in 1870 and is about a guy who asks the woman he loves to make him her slave. It is also where the term sadomasochism comes from. Needless to say, it's weird.
If Venus in Furs was a dating guide this is what it would sound like:
"Woman, as Nature created her and as she is currently reared by man, is his enemy and can be only his slave or his despot."
"Man and woman are natural-born enemies . . . the person who doesn't know how to subjugate will all too quickly feel the other's foot on the nape of their neck."
"The more devoted the woman is, the more quickly the man sobers up and becomes domineering. But the crueler and more faithless she is, the more she mistreats him . . . the less pity she shows him, the more she arouses the man's yearning to be loved and worshipped by the woman."
"A woman's character is her lack of character. The best woman sinks momentarily into filth, the worst woman unexpectedly rises to great good deeds."
If The Rules could sell 80 billion copies or whatever, I could totally repackage this and make it a bestseller. He's Just Not That Into You Having Free Will? Men Are From Mars, Women Are The Devil?
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