Venus in Furs (Penguin Classics S.)

by Larry Wolff (Introduction), Larry Wolff (Introduction), Leopold Von Sacher-Masoch (Author), Larry Wolff (Introduction), Joachim Neugroschel (Editor)

• New

  Paperback
  2000

  $17.49

  Venus in Furs describes the obsessions of Severin von Kusiemski, a European nobleman who desires to be enslaved to a woman. Severin finds his ideal of voluptuous cruelty in the merciless Wanda von Dunajew. This is a passionate and powerful portrayal of one man's struggle to enlighten and instruct himself and others in the realm of desire. Published in 1870, the novel gained notoriety and a degree of immortality for its author when the word masochism - derived from his name - entered the vocabulary of psychiatry. This remains a classic literary statement on sexual submission and control.

• Used

  Paperback
  2006

  $24.59

  Sometimes there are no limits to what you'll do for the person you love. From the first moment Severin sees Wanda, draped in furs, he is captivated by her beauty, and her cruelty. He will do anything to please her, and soon desire becomes obsession as they enter into a world of domination, pleasure and pain to which it seems there are no boundaries. But as Wanda's fantasies become increasingly brutal and she takes another lover, their games begin to get dangerously out of control.

• New

  Paperback
  2009

  $13.13

  First published in 1870, the author of 'Venus in Furs' defined - and unwittingly gave his own name to - that sexual proclivity we know as masochism in this understated, charged erotic classic. What woman could resist a trembling man handing her the whip? Severin is a young Galician nobleman with a secret; he can only love a woman with a ruthless heart, who will rain her whip upon him in a shower of bloody kisses. When he meets Wanda, the wealthy and beautiful widow living in the apartment upstairs, he wonders if she might be the one to help him realise his darkest desires. But Wanda is better than she ever dreamed possible at domination - and soon Severin realises he is powerless to escape what he has begun. Here, fantasy and reality writhe together in a ceaseless, fraught embrace...