(Best read playing Madonna’s ‘Erotica’ in the background)
Erotic literature does not always announce itself with naked bodies or graphic representations of sexual appetite. Often, it lives in the quiet longing, the prolonged glance, the suspended moment, the ache of wanting. This emotional erotica can move us more deeply than the sex itself. In her 1978 essay ‘Uses of the Erotic,’ Audre Lorde famously defines the erotic as “a source of power and information.” It is this power, often found in literary erotica, that so often fills the void left by an absent or unsatisfying love life. So, without further ado, I present to you three erotic books for the yearners, the lovesick, or the celibate who prefer to trace desire through pages.
The first book I have for you is Bonjour Tristesse by Françoise Sagan. Now not overtly sexual, this book explores youthful intimacy without consequence; it feels reminiscent of a first love or that person you met on holiday that you will never forget. Bonjour Tristesse is not arousing, it is intoxicating and hedonistic. Desire drifts through the book, always present, unavoidable, and never quite named.
Any conversation about erotic literature inevitably returns to its reigning queen, Anaïs Nin. Her book Delta of Venus is my next recommendation, perfect for anyone searching for their desires made manifest. Nin writes eroticism that is psychological and confessional; it is unadorned and deliberate, concerned less with bodies than with the slow unfurling and expression of desire itself. Delta of Venus was written in the 1940s and commissioned as pornography, yet despite this, it resists the mechanics of arousal in favour of female interiority. If you are searching for a book that keeps you company in the absence of a lover, Nin writes eroticism as intimacy rather than transaction, where lust becomes a powerful but subtle force.
Next is a book for readers who fall in love with sentences. Jeanette Winterson’s Written on the Body is possibly one of the most beautiful, raw books I have ever read. In this book, desire is a language and a promise of devotion. Winterson turns the body into a text to be read, the body becomes a sacred site of pleasure and shared passions, and eroticism becomes a philosophy. This book is for the Bones and All lovers, the readers who privilege metaphor over plot and who enjoy reading about pomegranates.
“I shall think of you every day, many times a day. Your handprints are all over my body. Your flesh is my flesh. You deciphered me, and now I am plain to read.” — Written on the Body by Jeanette Winterson
Consider these books your temporary lovers. Read them by candlelight, read them by the fire, or in the warmer months with sun-soaked bodies at the beach.
