Reading th� Lack of the Body Reading the Lack of the Body: The Writing of the Marquis de Sade Kathy Acker I am using this essay to do two things. To read a short passage from Philosophy in the Bedroom by the M arq uis d e Sade . To read one of h is tales. The m ore that I wr ite my own novels, the more it seems to me that to write is to read. 1 59 Kathy A cker I . TO WRITE I N ORDER TO LEAD THE R EADER I NTO A LABYRI NTH FROM WHICH THE READER CAN N OT EMERGE WITHOUT D ESTROYI N G THE WOR L D . O n January 1 2th 1 794, the Marq uis d e Sade was taken fro m the Madelonettes prison to his home s o that he could be present at the examination of his p apers . The next day, he was transferred to the Carmel ite convent on the rue de Vaugi rard. Here, h e spent a week with s ix other pr isoners, a l l of whom had fever which was mal ignant, two of whom died d u ring that wee k . De Sade was then marched to Sa int Lazare , . a hostel which h a d once been a lepers' home and was now a pr ison. O n J u ly 28 of the same y ear, M ax i mi l ien Robespierre was execute d . I n O ctober o f the same year, de S a d e was again l iberated fro m his ja i l . I n 1 795, a work in two s lender volumes entitled Philosophy In the Bedroom (La Philosophie Dans Ie Boudoir) , l a ' Posthu mous work of the Auth o r of Justine ',2 appeared i n London . The publ ication o f these vo lumes bo ostad the sale o f the nove l . The Pu rpose of F iction Philosophy In the Bedroom c onsists of seven d ia logues . Two of the four speakers are typical Sadean monsters , a M adame de Saint-An g e who in twelve years of marr iage has s lept with 1 2 ,000 men3 and Dolmanc e , 'the most corrupt and d a ngerous of men ' . The third, the C heval ier de Mi rvel , not qu ite as l ibertine as his sister, M adame de Saint-An g e , but then he is a man who has h eterosexual leanings, nonethel ess wil l ingly assists th e others in thei r seduction of the fo urth speaker, a fi fteen-year-old virg i n , Eugenie de Mistiva l . Seduction, as in corrup tion. In the Sadean universe , these two acts are equivalent. By the end of the seventh d ia logue, Eugenie had been sed u c e d . I n fact it took no time at al l , ten or twelve pa ges, for 1 60 !leading the Lack of the Body the scoundrel ly adults to rob the poor ch i ld of her v i rginity , Sade-style , i n t h e ass . But true vi rginity, f o r t h e M arquis , is not phys ica l . It takes the monsters of corruption more than 1 50 more pages to teach Eugenie that she can d o whatever she pleases: fuck and get fuc ked in every possib le way, b l aspheme God , . . . d isobey, fuck and sew up her mother's cunt to ensure that her mother wi l l no longer i nterfere in Eugeni e ' s affairs. The surface purpose, then , of the long and often tedious arguments that occupy most of Philosophy i s the c orruption of Eugeni e . De Sad e ' s deeper purpose in penning these d ia l ogues could not have been the seduction of a fi ctional fi fteen-year- o ld . Of a virgin who despises virginity and , even more , her mother always a s ign i n the Sadean universe of a propensity for freedom. M ost probably Eugenie was a fictional representation of de Sad e ' s s isterinlaw, Lady Anne Prospere de Launay. Though marr ied to the o lder s ister, de Sade had fal len vio lently in love with Anne; she returned his passion . De Sade ' s mother-in-law , Lady M ontreu i l , angered at l east by the sexual del i g hts of these two , did all that she could and succeeded in procuring de Sade ' s legal confi nement . I f the authorial p urpose i n the writing of Philosophy was revenge, if de Sade's purpose was to sew together. fict ional ly, his mother-i n-I aw's l ips, a l l of her l ips , i t was poor revenge at best. In 1 7 8 1 , Mademoisel le de Launay d i ed unmarried . De Sa de had not seen her since his imprisonment in Vincennes . The M arquis d id experience a strange revenge against his mother"i nIaw. I n August 1 793 , out of jai l . h e wrote , ' I am broke n , done i n , spittin g b lood. I told you I was presid ent of my secti on; my tenure has been so stormy that I am exhausted. (. . . ) Duri ng my presidency I had th e Montreui ls put on the l iste epuratoire (for pardon) . If I said a word they were l ost . I kept my peace. I have had my r,evenge' . 4 For a man as furious as de Sade, writing must be more than fictional revenge. Writing must break through the representational or fictional mirror and be equal in force to the horror experienced in dai ly l ife . Certainly the dialogues of Philosophy are seductions. But seducti ons of whom? Why did de Sade , born into the upper classes and then pent up in prisons not directly of h is own making, want to use writing only to seduce? 1 6 1 Kathy Acker Women in the World of Men Towards t h e e n d of the third d i a l o g u e i n Philosophy In th e Bedroom, E u g e n i e , no longer a v i rg in in a number of ways, admits to her female teacher that the m ost ' certain impulse' in her h eart, n ote that she does not say ' deepest ' , is to k i l l her mother. Eug enie i s admitting to n othing : a lmost as soon as she met Dolmance and M adame de Saint-An g e , she stated , sti l l v i rg i nal , that she loathed her mother. Dolmance and Saint-Ange had n o l ik ing for theirs . N o w , the g i r l and the woman talk about the posit ion of women in so ciety. Dolmance interrupts with the m a n ' s point-of�v iew. H e informs h i s p u p i l that a woman i n this society has b ut two choices : to whore or to wife. Due to her c l ass backgroun d , Eugenie is not d esti n ed for prostituti on , Dolmance continues , so she must consider her future position as a wife . I f she is to survive , a wife must _ serve her husba n d . H usbands know three sexual posit ions: ' sodomy, sacr i leg ious fancies , and pench ants to cruelty ' . The wife 's p os itio ns with regard to her husband ' s desires are g e ntleness. compl iancy, and agreeableness . Dolman c e ' s opin ion is that. i n this society, women must serve men i n order to survive. N o wonder that the women who want more than this , who want their freedom, hate th eir mothers . In d e Sade's texts , mothers a re prudes , haters of th eir own bodies , and re l ig i ous fanatics , for they are obedient to the tenets of a patr iarchal soc iety. The daughter who d o es not reject her mother interiorizes pr ison. The daughter who rejects her mother, such as M a d a me de Saint-Ange. such as Eugen i e . fi nds herself in an unbearable positi o n . In the patriarchal society , for women free d o m is untenable . As reg ards E ugeni e ' s freedom to k i l l her m other, Dolmance argues, she is free to d o this . she is free to d o any act, as long as she empl oys gui le and deceit . A woman who l ives in a patriarchal society can have power, control , and pleasure only when she is hypocriti cal and deceitfu l . With this statement of Dolmance 's , de Sade has erected , or laid down , once more, the foundations of the labyrinth of logic . 1 62 Reading the Lack of the Body N ow , the maze begins to be bui lt . Dolmance continues : Women are free to choose to act l i ke men. Women can 'transform ( " . J themselves i nto men by choosing to engage in sodomy ' . In sodomy, the most del ic ious position i s the 'passive one. In other words, a woman can know freedom by choosing to counterfeit a man who sel ects the botto m power position . H ere is one example of deceit . ' ( " . rTis a good i d ea ' , Dolmance conti nues to i nstruct his stu dent i n her search for power and p leasure , 'to have the breach open a lways ( . . . J ' . For her to remain an open hole . Do lmance may be seducing the seduced; that is not the purpose of this argument. Clearly de Sade is not. In this and other d ia logues, de Sode is bl indfold ing h is reader. The reader bel ieves that she or h e knows how to thi n k , how to think logical ly , how to k now; the reader bel ieves that she or he can know. The cogito . De Sade is leading this naive reader i nto the loss of be l ief i n the capabi l ity of such knowledg e , into the loss of sense . And leaving the reader in her or his lost-ness . It is here i n this text that d e Sade abandons the male gaze. Abortion and Logic A woman talks t o a woman about the positio n of women in a male-determined society; M adame de Saint-Ange and Eug€mie continue the discussion of women , freedom, and sodomy. A woman invari ably gives up any hope of freedom , mentions the older woman , as soon as she has a chi ld . A woman who wants to be free, above all , must avoid pregnancy. The d iscuss ion about female identity in society narrows down to the problem of abortion . Women ' s freedom, Saint-Ange s ays , depends u pon her a b i l ity to sto p preg nancy. De Sade argues i n order to sed u c e . These d ays , a typical pro-choice l iberal w i l l s a y that women must have the r ight and, therefo re, the opportunity to control their own b o d i es and make their own moral choices . Eugenie s idesteps al l l i beral ism; she asks whether it is moral ly p ermissib le to abort a chi ld who is just about to be born. 1 63 Kathy A cker Madame de Saint-Ange p icks up this bal l and runs home. H o m e , for de Sade, is l oc ated in h e l l . She repl ies that abortio n is equivalent to murder and that every woman h as th e rig ht to murder her own chi ld . 'Were it in the worl d , we should have the r ight to destroy it ' . Dolmance bursts i nto the female gaze, but does not b ust it up , by br inging up the subject of G o d : That ' ri ght is natural ( . . . ) it is incontestabl e ' . Only a bel ief in God, rather than i n N ature, could lead a human to value an embryo more than herself . Note Dolman c e ' s mention of or cal l to N ature. I n the p atriarchal society, there are n o women; there are only victims and male substitutes . And men . Nature is female becaus e , as is the case with women , she does not exist . She does not have existence apart from that g aze which is always male or male- define d . Luce I ri g aray on the subject of the possib le n ature of Nature with in the p atriarchal structure: ' Of course what m atters is not the existence of an object as such it is indifferent but the s imple effect of a representation upon the subject, its reflect ion, that i s , in the imagination of a man ' . 5 De Sade is not presenting n o r has he any interest in presenting a pro-c hoice argument. He has as l i ttl e interest in abort ion as he has i n N ature , i n the nature of Nature . I n the nature of women. De Sade is ta lk ing about obort ion in order to seduce us, h is readers , i nto the labyrinth where noth ing matters because , there , nothing can matter. N oth ing can mean anythi n g , for a l l is c onfusion . De Sade is a patr iarch who hates patri archy and h as nowhere else to g o . And , ja i l -rat that he is , raging in h is cage or m aze, he uses text to overthrow our v i rg in it ies , v i rgi nit ies not b orn from the body but fro m the l ogos; he seduces us thro ugh writ ing into overthrowi ng o ur very Cartesian selves . N either male nor female seem to be left. . . 1 64 Reading the Lack of the Body I I . READI NG A TALE BY DE SADE: WRITI NG O R READI NG WHOSE ONLY PURPOSE IS TO DESTROY ITSELF. ' ( " . ) The traces of my tomb wi l l d isappear from the surface of the earth as I hope my memory wi l l vanish from the memory of men ' . 6 The M arquis de Sade The Body In 1 7 78 , de Sade projected a co l lection of stor ies entit led Contes et Fabliaux de Dixhuitieme Siecle Par un Troubadour Proven9al. The book would consist of th i rty stories; tragedy would a lternate with comedy. The col lection never appeared . In 1 800, e leven of the tragic and dramatic tales were publ ished in fo ur smal l volu mes under the title of L es Crimes de I 'Amour. The Garden of Logos One of these c ri mes, named Florville and Courval, or the Works o f Fate, begins as a fairy tal e : good exists; evi l exists ; good is . the opposite of evi l . A certain Monsieur d e Courval is a good man because h e is sex ual ly str ict or pure . His former wife was a bad woman because she l i ked to have sex and was l iberti n e . Within t h e fairy tale genre l ie t h e assumptions that its readers , if not the c haracters within the fi cti o n , are capable of making moral dist incti ons and that moral ity is dual isti c . This fa i ry tale world borders o n being mechanica l : M . de Courval is good; therefore he is seeking o ut the good; therefore he is searching for a g ood wife . (A new wife . ) Th rough the help of a fri end, h e finds a wife-candi date who seems to q ual i fy as good. N ow the marr i age or the end of the fairy tale should take place, but it doesn 't . The site of the fa i ry ta le turns i nto that o f the law court . The l anguage of the fairy tale turns into that of the l aw court . 1 65 Kathy A cker Behind every fai ry tale l i es the law. S ince the wife-candidate is an orphan , her class is unknown. Therefor e , her mora l status and , s o , her i dentity is unclear. M. de C ourval m ust decide whether or not the woman is g ood enough to marry. S ince he is r ic h , male, and n ineteen years o lder than her, he p ossesses all the attr ibutes of a judge; he o ught to be able to judge her moral worth . I f s h e i s judged good , the law c ourt wi l l turn into the place of marri a g e . I f not, the characters and the reader wi l l f ind themselves i n the site of tragedy. The Wom a n ' s Tale/Her Version of the Garden of Logos The wife-candidate , a certa i n M ademoise l le F lorvi l l e , announces that she wi l l tel l a t a l e , h e r tal e , s o t h a t t h e o lder, r ich man wi l l be ab le to judge her p roperly. She adds that she is presenti ng C o urval with this autobiography to convince h i m not to marry her. In this mora lly-defi ned society, her desire is irrat ional ; here is a h o l e , the first in the mechanistic movement of the ex-fairy tal e , of the moral ity-determined c ause-and- effect. In d e Sade 's texts , every l apse of l o g i c or ho le announces the s i te of a labyri nth . Every labyrinth is a machine whose purpose is to unvei l chaos . Remember : i n de Sade 's texts , stories exist fo r the p urpose of sed ucti on . De Sade co nstructs h is labyri nths out of mi rrors. Mad emoisel le de F lorvi l l e 's story, in its beginnings , mi rrors the narrative in which it is locate d . J ust as there were two poles, good and evi l , or the h usband and his ex-wife, i n the outsid e story , h ere t h e reader, through Mademoise l le de F l orvi l l e , meets Madame de Lerince whose soul is beautiful (and , presumably, whose body does not exist) and Madame d e Verqu i n i n whom ' fr ivol ity, the taste o f p leasure, and i ndependence ' reign supreme . B oth these women are k in to M. de Saint-Prat, F lorvi l l e ' s substitute father. In the larger tal e , since F lorv i l le was an orphan, she was situated between the poles of g o od and evi l ; in this sto ry with i n a story, the two older women fi g ht for control over the site of Fl orvi l l e ' s body. 1 66 Reading the Lack of the Body This story withi n a story begins with F lorv i l le , the u ntouched body. So that no one wi l l suspect h im in al l h is goodness of harbouring secret incestuous Intentions , her guardian , M. de Saint-Prot, sends her off to his sister, Madame de Verq u l n . H i s act, whose i ntent ion seems g o o d , l eads to evi l . In Its beginnings, the fem a l e ' s g arden of l o gos is moral ly muddy . M adame de Verqu ln I ntroduces F lorvi l l e t o h e r ' handiwork ' , a youth named Senneva l . Senneval proceeds to seduce the young g i r l . impregnate her, refuse to marry her, abandon her. Eugenie, now q uite muddled, bears a son whom Senneval removes from her. H as Eugenle become evi l? Not yet , judges her substitute- father, as M . de C o u rval wi l l jud g e , when Eugenie returns to h i m . He tries to show her that she can sti l l return to the good or proper path of the g arden : ' Happiness ' , declares M. de Saint- Prot, ' i s to be found s o lely in the exercise of v i rtue ( . . . ) . Al l the apostl es of cr ime are but miserable , desperate c reatures ' . He adds that society i s vital ly i nterested i n seeing good multiply and fl our ish . Georges Batai l le in h is Literature and Evil, whose s ixth essay is devoted to the work of de Sade , repl ies that society 's only good is its own survival , that 'soci ety is g overned by its wil l to survive ' . 7 The fi ght between good and evil for the body of F lorvi l le is in ful l sway. In order to ensure that she becomes g o o d , M. de Saint-Prot now sends her off to Madame de Leri nce . At the same time , 'a secret fee l i n g ' which is drawing her ' ineluctably toward th e site of so m a ny past pleasures' keeps the young mother in touch with M adame de Verquin . Once penetrated , the b ody or g arden cannot forget the pl easure that stemmed from its penetratio n . That garden whose paths a r e sti l l c learly labeled good and evil though they touc h and c ross each other wi l l now become a maze . Knowledge with regard to the abi l ity to make moral d istincti ons , thus the capabi l i ty for judg.ement, d isappears . A catastrophe , ' a tale s o cruel and bitter it breaks my heart' takes p lace. M adame de Leri n g e , this good woma n , introduces 1 67 Kathy A cker F lorvi l l e who is now 34 years o l d , no longer innocent, to a boy half her a g e . Th e Cheval ier d e Saint-An g e . A d angerous s ituatio n f()r a woman. H is or ig ins , l i k e Florvi l l e ' s , are unknown; unknown, the state of h is moral ity . T h e second narrative mir ror : When Saint-Ange is in t h e act of raping F l orvi l le , she bel ieves thather sexual past with Senneval is repeating itself . In o rd e r to sh atter the mirror whose name is abandonment and pain, s h e k i l ls this l over jrapist with a pai r of sc issors . As soon as F lorv i l le recognises that she has murdered the boy, she cr ies, 'Oh you ! Whose only cr ime was to love me overmu c h (" . ) ' . This second narrative mirror does not reiterate and aid sight or understanding: it only blurs and confuses . F lorvi l le 's moral status is now not confused, but unfathomabl e . Was she r ight or wrong to kil l? Was Saint-Ange driven by passion or by unjustifiable aggression and violence? Why did she murder SaintAnge? Was she motivated by her memory of the past, by her fear of again yielding to sexual desire? Di d she murder because she too bl indly obeyed the moral d ictates of her society, because she too deeply feared that she might not be good? In this c ase of rape and of murder, who is good and who is evi l? In this case , what is the good and of what does evil consist? What is c ertain is that with the end of the first half of Florvi l le 's autobiography , de Sade fully abandons the languages of the fairy tale and of the cold, precise narrative of the law court. The formal verbal g arden of moral ity whose arrangement is that of the logos has decayed: all that is left is the wi lderness , almost the chaos and violence , of passion . F lorvi l le began to speak this language, this language whose narrative i rrationality gu ides , when she admitted that something i n her, something 'secret ' , unfathomable or unspeakable, was attracti ng her to M adame de Verquin, to the home of Madame de Verq uin. As soon as she has scissored Sain.t-Ange, she speaks nothing but this language: ' ( . . . ) My feelings for you were perhaps far superi or to those of the tender love whi ch burned in your heart' , F lorvi l le confesses to the corpse of her rapist who or which is also the c orpse of her moral worth . The fi rst h al f of the woman 's story ends i n this : I n confusion cross ing over i nto chaos . In the overthrow of moral distinctions . 1 68 Reading the Lack of the Body Such was F loJVil l e ' s purpose when she began to ta l k , to tel l her tal e , to her judg e . I nterlude Yet Courval has not been overthrown. Not yet overthrown to himself. He does not yet sit in horror: he sti l l be l i eves that he can judge another perso n . A woman. He informs F lorvi l l e , with a return to the language of the law court, that because the murder was not premeditated, she is innocent of that m u rder, therefore h e wants to m arry h er. The Destruction, Through the Female Gaze, of the Male World Florvi l le may have caused the garden of l og os to wither away, but s ince she has not destroyed Courva l , her judge or husband-to-be, she continues her tale . Remember: i n de Sad e ' s texts, stories exist for the purpose of seducti o n . M . de Courval h a s just i nformed F lorvi l le that her rape by and murder of Saint-Ange does not matter; now, withi n this story-withi n-a-story , M. de Saint-Prot and M a d ame de Lerince who are also good tell F lorvi l le the same thi n g . They h i d e her murd er from the worl d . This third narrative mirror in which the good a i d a n d abet a murderer announces the real ity of dream. The language of passion; now, narrative contro l l e d by dream. Who needs Freud when d e Sade's around? The world of l ogos is in the process of dying; now there is dream; soon death wil l reign through the g arden of identic terror. Then, there shal l be no more judgement, n o more the l aw courts of the worl d . F lorvi l le dreams a dream in which Senneval shows h e r two corpses . One is the c o rpse of the p ast, male . It or he is Saint- Ange . The second is the corpse of the future , fem a l e . She is stra nge, as yet unnamed. 1 69 Kathy A cker After the dream is over, the worl d of death begins . De.ath upon death wi l l l itter the remainder of F lorvi l l e ' s autobiography, of her seduction of her l istener, of her destruction of his male gaze . The death of M adame de Verq u i n . Good and evi l have reversed themselves. In this worl d . The evi l woman d ies beautiful ly . S ince she l ived through a n d for the body, s ince she acc epted material ity and its l aws , the swing and sway of change a n d of chance, Mad ame d e Verquin acc epts her immi nent d eath and dies with ' courage and reaso n ' . For she does not attempt to c l ing to possess ing , to use possessions to r ig id i fy i d entity : she wil ls al l of her possessions to be flu n g , after her d eath , to w h omever according to the dictates of the lottery. Secon d , the death of a strange and older wo man. F lorv i l le is responsi b le for seal ing th is 'woma n ' s doom ' . Seemingly by chan c e , for F lorv i l le d oes not recognise the stranger, for Fl orvi l le und erstands none of what she sees n o r what is happenin g . This is the realm , beyo n d good and evi l , of c h a n c e . B efore she is executed thanks to t h e words but n o t th e wi l l of the n arrator, the stranger tel ls F lorvi l le that she had dreamed a dream about F l orv i l le before she ever m et Fl orvi l l e . Dreams are true in the realm beyo nd good and evi l . The stranger dreamed that F lorvi l le was with her son and a scaffol d . Now , w e , t h e readers , u n derstand none o f what w e are read i n g . The third female death i s o f M a d a m e de Leri n c e . Back in the wor ld where evil is g o o d , and good , evi l , this most sa intly of women d ies miserably, stuffed l ike a p otato with remorse and regret. ' M adame d e Leri n c e ' s fears are virtu e ' s anxi ety and conc ern ' . The universe of j u dgement and of the l aw is not only the one i n which good is evi l . evi l . g o o d , b ut is the p lace wh�re vi rtue creates fe ar. Fear, the i l lusion that gives birth to all other i l l us ions . Fear of the past return ing and the fear of not being virtuo us once d rove F lorvi l le to murder Saint-Ange with a sewing to o l . F lorvi l l e ' s autobiog raphy ends here , in d eath . 1 70 Reading the Lack of the Body I nterlude Yet Courval is sti l l a l ive and sti l l bel ieves that h e can judge Florvi l l e and thus m arry h er. Destruction, By the Male Gaze, of the World of Men : Oedipus I nverted As in Oedipus Rex, a stranger now enters and tel ls his tal e : He identifies himself a s one of the two chi ldren born to Courval and his first wife, the son who was as debauched as his mother. Estranged from h is father, he is now strange to his father. He next i dentifies himself as the Senneval who seduced Florvi l le , then spirited away the male fruit of that seduction. That male fruit, when he grew up, raped and was murdered by his own mother, F lorvil le . Senneval further explains that the older woman whom Florvi l le had not recognised and whom Florvi l le 's testimony had condemned to execution was Courval 's first wife . Senneval 's younger sister did not die as Courval had believed; her name Is Florvil le . The stranger has not told h i s tale to seduce Florvi l le , b ut rather to instruct her who she is. For the first time in her l i fe, she is no longer an orphan . For the first time in her l i fe , she knows that she did not wil l yet caused h er mother 's death, s lept with her brother, murdered her brother's and her son, and might marry her father. For the first time in her l ife, Florvi l le has been given an identity card into the world of h uman and the name on that identity card is unbearable. The fourth narrative mirror: As the stranger was once strange to his l isteners , Florvil le was strange to herself. No longer strange to herself, her knowledge, which is always self-knowledge, is not bearable . In the same way, de Sade was once strange to us, his readers . De Sade, the monster. Strangers and monsters: outsiders. As the stranger told Florvil le his tale and strangeness was disappeared into the chaos of self-knowledge, so de Sade was tell ing his tale and now is no longer strange. ' For I a m d e Sade; I am that monster. ' Whose name is human. 1 71 Kathy A cker The Body, D isa ppeared Oedi pus was able to d eal with his knowledge of the se lf whose logos is chaos by casting out his own eyes . Casting as i n castrating. F lorv i l le c annot c astrate herself : a t t h e e n d of ' Courval a n d F lorvi l le ' when there a re n o tales l eft to tel l , F lorvi l l e m ust commit su ic ide and d o es'. This i s d e Sade's tal e : th e n on-ta le , the tale that does n o t exist . D e Sade, also masochistic , b ound up, pent and spent in p rison, had no tale l eft and nowhere to g o . F o r F lorv i l le and for de Sad e , there i s only t h e world in which th is tale began, the wor ld dominated by men, the wor ld of male language , pr i son . . Regard the Oedipal myth : The Law of the State forbid s , above all , t h e murder of its King . A t t h e s a m e time , s ince n o h u m a n can be immorta l , t h e real survival o f t h e state depends upon that very death and the replacement of the Ki ng . The Law protects , by repressi ng , and al l repress ion is also the repressio n of knowi n g , the d ivis ion between the sym bo l , the immortal Head , and the symbol ised , the human w h o , though k ing , is h imself subject to the l aws of mater ia l ity , esp ecia l ly of sexual ity and of death . As soon as Oedipus answers the Sphinx 's q u estion correctly, he h as access to the symbol ised or the verboten : to the body and sexual ity o f his m other . The Law is not patri archal because it d en ies the existe nc e , even the power, of wome n : after al l , every K ing h as H is Queen. The Law is patri archal because it den ies the bodies , the sexual iti es o f women. I n patr iarchy, th ere is no menstru al b lood . De Sade has nowhere to go becaus e , for h im, there are no actual women. In h is texts, women are either vi ctims or substitute-men . H atin g the society b ased on central ised power (the immortal King ) , de Sade most often chose to see through the female gaze, but this female gaze is sti l l the g aze , that act of conscio usness that must dominate , therefore defi n e , al l i t sees . The gaze which, though seemingly female , is a lways male i s . that s ight whose visual c orrespond ent is the mi rror. In the m irror, one o n ly sees oneself . S ince there are no women , women with bodies , for d e Sad e , he cannot esc ape th e 1 7 2 Reading the Lack of the Body l abyri nth of mi rrors and become a l l that the l aw h as repressed . When the mi rrors break , to see is to become. De Sa de did not c ast out his eyes (castrate himself) . Rather, he shattered mirror after mirror; behind every mirror stood another mi rror; behind al l mirrors , nothingness s its . De Sade wrote in order to seduce us , by means of h is labyrinths of mirrors , into nothing ness . De Sade wanted to show o r to teach us who we are; he wanted fo r us to learn to want to not exist. Th is is nothing ness . H e wanted his fictional structures to be mirrors of the world or that horror from whi c h , for h im, there was no escape: ' ( " . ) The traces of my tomb wi l l d isappear from the surface of the earth as I hope my memory wi l l vanish from the memory of men ' . B De Sad e , born a patriarc h , understood patriarchy and raged against th e walls of that labyri nth . 1 73 Kathy A cker N OTES 1 . S ince I a m reading from the E n gl ish translatio n , I shal l refer to texts by their standard English tit les. 2 . G i lbert Lely , Th e Marquis de Sade, A Biography, trans. by Alec B rown (New Yor k : Grove Press , 1 962) , p . 39 1 . 3 . N ote d e S a d e ' s real isti c tendencies. 4 . Letter fro m d e Sade to Gaufridy, q uoted in Geoffrey Gorer, The Life and Ideas of the Marquis de Sade (London: Panther Books , 1 964) , p . 52 . 5 . Luce I r igaray, Speculum of the Other Woman, trans . by Gi l l ian C . Gi l l ( N ew York : Cornel l U nivers ity Press , 1 985) ' p . 20 7 . 6 . De Sa d e q uoted b y Apol l inai re q uoted by Georges Batai l le i n his Literature and Evil. trans. by Alastair Hami lton ( N ew York : Ur ize n Books , 1 973) , p . 89. 7 . Batai l le , p .6 . 8 . Batai l l e , p . 89. 1 74 CO NT R I B UT O RS Kathy Acker is the a uthor of Bloo d and Guts in High School, Empire of the Senseless, Great Expectations and My Death, My Ufe , by Pier Paolo Passo lin i. She is current ly wo rki ng on a new novel and teaches at the San Francisco Art I nstitute. David All ison i s a Professor of Phi losophy at the State U n ivers ity of New York, Stony Bro o k . He is the e d it o r of The New Nietzsche (Delta , 1 977) and is c u rrently co-edit ing a vo lume (with M a rk Ro berts and Al len Weiss) e nt it led Sa de Beyond Measure: Categories of Reading, which wi l l be publ ished i n t h e spring of 1 994. Justin Barton has been a m e m ber of PL/ 's editor ia l board s ince 1 99 1 a n d is a g ra duate student i n the P hi lo sophy department at t he U n iversity of Warw i c k . H e is c u rrently workin g on his PhD thesis about the role of the fut u re in N ietzschean and Dele uzian genealogies . Margaret C rosland i s the edito r of The Passionate Philosopher: A Marquis de Sade Reader (Minerv a , 1 993) , The Mystified Magistrate (Peter Owe n , 1 986) and The Gothic Tales of the Marquis de Sa de ( 1 990). She has written b iographies O n C o l ette , Coctea u , E d ith P iaf a nd S i m o n e de Beauvoir. Catherine Cusset is an Assistant Professor of Fre n c h at Ya le U n ivers ity . She h as published a novel entit led La Blouse Roumaine (Gal l imard , 1 990) and severa l art ic les on Sad e , earl ier l ibert ine noveli sts, a n d Rococo painters, i n L 'lnfini, French Forum, and Eighteenth-Century Fiction. Lucienne FrappierMazur is a Professo r of French Lite rature at the U n ive rs ity of Pennsylva nia. She is the auth o r of a book o n Ba lzac ' s Come die humaine, o f Sade et I 'ecriture d e I 'orgie. Pouvoir et parodie dans 'L 'Histoire de Juliette ' ( 1 99 1 ) and of many artic les o n Balza c , Stendhal , Nodier, Sand a n d the e ig hteenth century e rotic nove l . 1 75 Amy Hanson h as been a m e m ber of PLI 's e ditorial board s ince 1 99 2 . She received her Master of Arts i n E n g l ish fro m the U n ivers ity of Wa rwick special iz ing i n Fau lkner, M od e rnism , Post-Colo n i a l Lite rat u re , a n d Crit ical The o ry . She is c u rrently writ ing her first screenplay. Annie Le Brun i s one of her generat i o n ' s forem ost a ut h orities on Sad e . After a study on the late e ig hteenth century E uropean black novel entit led Les Chateaux de la Subversion (98 2) , she pro d u c e d two works on the Marquis de Sad e : Soudain u n bloc d 'abime, Sa d e ( 1 98 6) and Sade, aller e t deto urs ( 1 989) . She is a l s o the c o editor of Sad e ' s Oeuvres Completes. Oeepak N arang Sawhney has been a member of PL/ 's editorial board s ince 1 992 . H e received his M aster of Arts i n Conti nent a l P h i l oso phy fro m t he U n iversity o f Warwic k spec ia l iz ing i n N ietzsche a n d Bata i l l e . H e i s currently c o m plet ing his PhD t hesis o n fascism and technology in Dele uze . Stephen Pfohl is a writer, perform ing a rtist video maker and P rofesso r of Sociology at Boston Col leg e , where he teaches courses in social theory , social psychoqnalys is , c u lt ura l st ud ies and t h e socio logy of devi ance and soCial c o ntrol . Stephen ' s rec e nt w rit ings inc lud e Death a t the Parasite Cafe: Social Science (Fictions) and the Postm o dern (St . M a rt i n ' s Press/MacMi l lan , 1 992); Images of Deviance and Social Con trol: a Sociological History, 2nd E d . (McGrawH i l I . 1 993) and the forth c o m i n g Venus in Video: Male Mas(s)ochism and Ultramo dern Power. Stephen was also the 1 99 1 -92 p ' res ident of the Soc iety for the Study of Social Problems. Phil ippe Sollers i s an author and intel lectual who has been writ ing fo r fo rty years . H is wo rks include Sur Ie m aterialisme ( 1 9 74) , Femmes ( 1 983) , and Le Secre t ( 1 993) . In 1 992, h e received t h e G ra n d P rix d e Litterature from the Acad e m ie Fran<;aise for h is l ife 's work. 1 76 Pli Warwick Journal of Philosophy Back issues: Deleuze and the Transcendental Unconscious inc lud ing a rt ic les by Alphonso l ingis and Brian Massumi Kant: Trials of Judgment i nc lud ing art icles by Jean-Luc Nancy and H oward Cayghi l l Feminist P h i losophy i nc lud ing art ic les by M a rgaret Whitford and Luce I rigaray Forthcoming i ssues: The Responsibi l ities of Deconstruction Cyberotics Jean -Luc Nancy: Com m u n ity, Myth and the Polit ical I f you wo uld l i ke to subscribe to PLI o r c o ntr ibute an a rt ic le , p lease contact us at the fo l lowing address : PLI Department of Ph i loso phy U niversity of Warwic k Coventry CV4 7 AL ENGLAN D 1 77 r I

, '. fJ1ie 'lJi'lline S acCe eaitea 6y t])eepaf(9{p,rang Sawliney PLI Warwic�Journa{ of Pliifosopliy The Divine Sade, the first compilation of essays on the Marquis de Sa de (1740-1814) published in Great Britain, is a ground breaking and innovative volume, With contributors ranging from Kathy Acker to Philippe Sollers, The Divine Sade presents an expansive philosophical exploration of this compelling figure. Furthermore, The Divine Sade examines the historical, literary, religious and theatrical framework of Sade's work, and includes translations of Annie Le Brun and Philippes Sollers' essays produced specifically for this issue. Kathy Acker Reading the Lack of the Bpdy: The Writing of the Marquis de Sade David Allison Sade's Itinerary of Transgression Margaret Crosland Madame de Sade and Other Problems Catherine Cusset Sade: Critique of Pure Fiction Lucienne Frappier-Mazur A Turning Point in the Sadean Novel: The Terror Annie Le Brun Sade and the Theatre Stephen Pfohl Seven Mirrors of Sade: Sex, Death, CAPITAL and the Language of Monsters Philippe Sollers Sade Contra the Supreme Being ISBN 1-897646-01-