From elf@halcyon.com (Elf Sternberg)
Organization Pendor, UnLtd.
Date 17 Dec 1997 21:46:16 GMT
Newsgroups soc.subculture.bondage-bdsm
While browsing in a record store, of all places, I stumbled across a copy of "Imaginative Sex," the how-to book on male dominance and female submission (mostly) written by John Norman, author of the much-vaunted (or much-despised) Gor series. "Imaginative Sex" was first released in 1974; the editor claims "It sold well enough until recently, when it became necessary (for reasons that escape me) for Masquerade to release it again." This suprised me; I've never seen it in bookstores before and I've been looking since a friend in 1984 showed me (but would not lend me) his dog-eared 1974 printing.
In any event, it's definitely out again. And this time it has the honor of Pat Califia to write the introduction. It might seem odd that a radical lesbian like Califia would write the intro, but after reading her work for the past decade it's perfectly understandable. She loves living on the edge and, as she so eloquently puts it, in this age of tolerance and correctness John Norman still gets a rise out of people. He pisses people off and he still arouses people with his unfettered view of male dominance and female submission.
After re-reading it, I agree to some extent with Califia's view of Norman. Yes, he is infuriating; on the other hand, it's clear he's obsessed with his partner's pleasure. Yes, he lacks the vocabulary we do-- in his era that vocabulary hadn't been invented yet-- but it's clear that Norman starts with the assumption that the people involved *want* to be where they are.
Ignore the bad politics and even worse science, but I do recommend you get the book. It's consistently full of Norman's peculiar-- and hot-- brands of fantasy but without all officious exposition that goes into the Gor novels. It's good stuff, if handled with care. Like BDSM.
Elf
From Philip the Foole
Organization Netcom
Date Wed, 17 Dec 1997 20:36:41 -0800
Newsgroups soc.subculture.bondage-bdsm
Here's a review of Imaginative Sex Margaret and I posted a couple of months back:
Foole: Check out John ("Gor") Norman's humorously titled "Imaginative Sex," recently re-issued with a forward by (surprise) famed leatherdyke erotica author Pat Califia. Norman is kind of a one-trick pony fetish-wise, but if you enjoy a nearly 100% pure diet of male top/female bottom "abduct, tie up and rape" scenarios, he has a pretty good collection of ideas here. He even has a couple of female top scenarios to give the little woman a taste of what it feels like to be the big, strong, natural male master. It would help if he relieved his singularly humorless, endless, droning "Men are big and strong. Women are small and weak. Therefore men are natural masters and women are natural slaves who secretly long to be captured and raped" lectures with an occasional: "Professional basketball players are big and strong. Therefore all shorter men (well, guys like Philip the Foole anyway) long to kneel before them and suck their dicks." Surprisingly, Norman does not advocate *actual* flogging, but merely simulating beatings by hand clapping, while the submissive partner reacts "as if" struck. He seems to feel that SM folks who do it "for real" should seek medical attention. I only seek medical attention in cases like this weekend when I hit a vein in Margaret's breast while I was torturing her with sharp needles. The medical attention was not for her, but for me. She beat me up afterward for sloppy topping, bruising one of the major assets in her pro Domme business. There is nothing quite as satisfying for a masochist as being caned by a woman who is *really* annoyed with him. "A man should aspire to be the helpless victim of the furious rage of a beautiful woman." - Swineburne.
I'm not sure where I fit in Norman's world view, being a male who very much enjoys being abducted, tied up and "ravished" by a dominant female (that would be Lady Foole and Margaret Morecock, specifically. They *hate* it when I use generic terms.) Of course, as a switch, I enjoy *both* ends of the flogger. Maybe I will take Norman's advice and start clapping my hands instead of actually hitting my partner with the whip. I'm afraid that hand clapping instead of actual beating might detract from the "psycho killer" aspect of my personality that Margaret seems to enjoy. All of this griping aside, "Imaginative Sex" is still a pretty good collection of M/f "capture, tie up and rape" fantasy scenarios.
Margaret Morecock: Philip and I bought our copies of "Imaginative Sex" together, at an airport gift shop, at the end of our most recent weekend together. I noticed, as we were walking away, that the boyish counter-clerk suppressed merriment at the sight of two giggling, endorphined-out middle-aged dweebs buying a pair of matching sex manuals. "Ah well, " I told the clerk, "we're too old to do it, but at least we can read up on it!" Heh, heh. If only he knew. If only *John Norman* knew...
Foole: There's a little bookstore at the Chicago Airport that *always* has a shelf in the back full of BDSM books. I like to have a little erotic reading for the plane going home, since tying up Margaret's incredibly sexy nude body with duct tape and slowly piercing her nipple while she maintains a calm, steady stream of threats sometimes arouses me a bit.
Margaret: Pat Califia says she masturbates to Norman books, which I find fascinating, since I often masturbate to thoughts of Pat Califia. Does the powerful-looking, pale-haired woman who is pictured on the back cover of "Melting Point" in victorian attire, smilingly flexing a cane, have fantasies about being a Gorean slave-girl? *shudder* Gosh, I hope so. I wouldn't be a bit surprised, either. Writers like Califia --and for that matter, Philip the Foole -- creatively and humorously stretch and broaden our consciousness of role and gender. They have learned the rules and, in the manner of artists and jazz musicians, they happily break them to suit their purposes of wildly creative erotic self-expression. These are the kind of role-models I am grateful to have.
Foole: Margaret has some definite gay male top tendencies. I *love* that quality in a woman. She likes to fist me as she threatens to grow a real dick and fuck me with it. It's *so* delicious to improvise with someone who can do the "Dueling Banjos" number right back at you, continuously matching and amplifying. No matter where I go, there she is.
Your Humble Jester,
Philip the Foole
Norman, John, Imaginative Sex (foreward by Pat Califia), NY, Masquerade, 1997 (first published 1974) $7.95
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