Customer Reviews

Sublime Surrender: Male Masochism at the Fin-De-Siecle (Cornell Studies in the History of Psychiatry)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Stewart asserts that "male masochism was a rhetorical strategy through which men asserted their cultural and political authority paradoxically by embracing the notion that they were (and always had been) wounded and suffering." A bold claim which the author largely backs up with reference to the works of von Sacher-Masoch, Freud and Wagner, showing that, in her words, "masochistic scenarios, whether in literature, music, the visual arts, or medicalized diagnoses of the fin-de-sicle malaise, stage the male as one who submits to an aestheticized and eroticized gaze and voice." More or less exactly what I feel when I enter Milady's dungeon for a brutal flogging.

Since I just received the book this is actually a review of the seller. It is in this space because for some reason I can't get the feedback button to work. The book arrived in much better condition than I had expected for such a great price. And even after a post office snafu the seller went out of her way to see that the book arrived as quickly as possible and obviously packaged with great care. My review of this seller is Excellent. The first ten pages of the book are excellent as well.