Philosopher of Evil E-Book

Walter Drummond

• Herausgeber: Olympia Press
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

Man or Monster? What drove this 18th Century nobleman to pen the works that made the name de Sade forever infamous? His life was a sorry record of imprisonment for the terrible deeds he perpetrated. But what of his books? Revolutionist, gaolbird, sentenced to die--and yet, also a Chief Justice finally deposed by the French Revolution because he was too humane--what was he trying to say to the world? Was he, in embracing all Evil, hopefully testing the power and validity of good? In this brand new biographical analysis of the Marquis de Sade and his works, Here Is The Answer.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Philosopher of Evil

FOREWORD

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

Philosopher of Evil

Walter Drummond

This page copyright © 2009 Olympia Press.

FOREWORD

THIS IS A BOOK describing the life and works of a man who has been dead for one hundred and fifty years. Dead and lying headless in his grave. He lies headless because the quack who was examining his skull, lost it. And his skull was being examined in an attempt to find some monstrous bump that would make it possible to separate the Marquis de Sade from the rest of the human race.

We have this habit, people do, of labeling certain human beings and human actions as “inhuman.” What we mean is that there are certain human impulses we find it uncomfortable to acknowledge. Sometimes more than merely uncomfortable. Some people go into a panic at the thought of being people. Some people try to eradicate every sign of mere humanity within themselves. They impose upon themselves, and on others when they can, standards of “perfection” which are supposed to be unquestioned and unquestionable. You can ask any psychiatrist about the catastrophic things that happen when people try to deny what is going on inside them, instead of acknowledging it and trying to understand it so that they can live in a civilized manner—rather than under a self-imposed dictatorship.

We were talking about the Marquis de Sade and his books. For several centuries, various people and authorities have been trying to arrange matters so that the Marquis could be ignored and his books could be wiped out. Perhaps that would be a good thing. Grant it for the sake of argument. The fact is that the battle is being lost. The attempt has had to fall back one step, and now also has to concern itself with the growing body of discussion about the Marquis and his books.

Because the sad fact is that the Marquis was all too human. His personality was twisted to the point where all its antisocial features were most prominent, yes. But he was also quite capable of generosity and mercy, and he drew sharp distinctions between what was permissible in private life and what was acceptable in public. Nor did he invent sadism, by a long shot. That particular set of human impulses has been given his name only because he had the bad practical sense to describe them on paper. (Though it was the public, not he, who made him notorious. If the Marquis had really been a Martian, describing emotions that did not exist on Earth, no one would have found more than academic interest in his writings.)