Status
Available
Call number
Collection
Publication
Penguin Books Ltd 10/26/ (1989), Edition: New Ed, Paperback, 128 pages
Description
In 1928, Georges Bataille published this first novel under a pseudonym, a legendary shocker that uncovers the dark side of the erotic by means of forbidden obsessive fantasies of excess and sexual extremes. A classic of pornographic literature, Story of the Eye finds the parallels in Sade and Nietzsche and in the investigations of contemporary psychology; it also forecasts Bataille's own theories of ecstasy, death and transgression which he developed in later work.
User reviews
LibraryThing member souva
Georges Bataille’s infamous book “The Story of the Eye” always poses before me a difficult question—what is the difference between pornography and a normal work of fiction suffused with sexual elements? Or, to be more precise, should we call this book pornographic?
Like any pornographic
But at the same time, another aspect of the novel starts haunting us, thereby prohibiting us to arrive at a straightforward answer to the initial question. Rather than being content with the sexual experimentation of the couple, the narrative seems to become more and more preoccupied with an object, tracing its origin, development and subsequent transformation. The object is, as the title of the book suggests, the eye. Roland Barthes, in his essay “Metaphor of the Eye” (1962), rightfully says,
"What happens to the Eye (and no longer to Marcelle, Simone, or the narrator) cannot be identified with ordinary fiction.”
He further argues that instead of working within a partial imaginary world where author’s imagination is bounded by the limitations of reality, Bataille straightaway creates a completely imaginary paradigm which lies far beyond reality. Barthes calls this poetic imagination. In this imaginary realm, the object, namely, the Eye, shifts paradigmatically from one substitutive object to another (eggs, testicles and other ovular objects) retaining its geometrical identity, but, at the same time, losing its functional one, behaving as a pure metaphor. There runs another stream, similar in nature and parallel to the aforementioned one. This is a series of liquid metaphors within the text, which flow through tears, cat's milk, egg yolks, frequent urination scenes, blood and semen. These two parallel streams are interdependent and interacts with each other as well.
According to Barthes, the narrative element of the novel, the story of the narrator and Simone, is just a literary mechanism to facilitate this smooth shifting of the underlying objects. As Barthes says in his essay—
“The narrative is only a kind of flowing matter, a vehicle for the precious metaphoric substance; if we are in a park at night, it is so that a thread of moonlight can turn translucent the moist patch of Marcelle’s sheet, which floats out the window of her room; if we are in Madrid, it is so that there can be a corrida, an offering of the bull’s testicles, the enucleation of Granero’s eye, and if in Seville, it is so that the sky there can express that yellowish liquid luminosity whose metaphoric nature we know by the rest of the chain…”
But, this analysis, though rigorous, doesn’t answer a rather simple question—why has such overtly sexual, if not pornographic, narrative been chosen as the carrier of the underlying metaphors? Or, rather, are we doing justice to the book by completely negating its narrative structure? What is the role of these erotic elements within the text?
If we closely follow the story, we’ll soon find out that, throughout the novel, sex and death, Eros and Thanatos, are irrevocably intertwined. Almost all the sexual encounters in the story culminate in either death or utter violence, be it Marcelle’s suicide, Granero’s death or strangulation of Don Aminado. The desperation of the couple to break free from their puritan parents, or at least to completely ignore them, quite categorically hints at the subversive urge of upturning the social taboos and stigmas, and also initiates a process of self-annihilation, the process of estranging oneself from his surroundings and coiling into a never-ending coition. It is far too similar to the state of ultimate bliss, or Nirvana, as prophesied by almost all the religions. But, this is only the beginning. Gradually, it dawns upon the reader that the entire erotic system established in the narrative, with all its rituals, fetishes and practices, is nothing but a primordial religion in itself. So, when the denouement comes with a blasphemous parody of the Catholic Eucharist involving desecration of the bread and wine using a dead priest’s urine and semen, it simply manifests the substitution of one fetishist system with another, substitution of Eucharist and consecrated hosts with eye, blood and semen. Therefore, the Barthesian shift of underlying metaphors finally surfaces and, in the process, engulfs those real metaphors (Eucharistic bread and wine), held so dear to Christianity.
Now, let us go back to our original question about the identity of “The Story of the Eye” as a pornographic fiction.
A truly great work of fiction always has the tendency to transgress. By transgression, I’m referring not only to transgressing the social norms, but also to transgressing the immediate literary genre within which it is operating. For example, Borges’ short story “Death and the Compass” apparently assumes the air of a detective fiction, but at the end, the story levitates to a metaphysical plane breaking loose from the confines of its immediate genre (i.e., detective fiction).
True, that Bataille works within the genre of pornography, utilising almost all of its tools (necrophilia, fetish, orgy etc.), but he also, at the same time, subverts it by the underlying maze of metaphors. The so-called pornographic infrastructure is necessary for him to explore the social taboos (also, the interrelation of sexual and religious fanaticism) and thereby transgressing them, but he never allows his readers to become too much engrossed in those superficialities, diverting their attention by the subliminal superstructure of metaphors and images. So, for Bataille, the use of pornography is, as Barthes suggests, a mere literary ploy, albeit a necessary one, but eventually his novel surpasses it.
Like any pornographic
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narrative, “The Story of the Eye” follows the sexual adventures of an unnamed late adolescent narrator and Simone, his female partner, in short episodic vignettes. It describes their activities in great details, ranging from orgy to necrophilia accompanied by sheer violence.But at the same time, another aspect of the novel starts haunting us, thereby prohibiting us to arrive at a straightforward answer to the initial question. Rather than being content with the sexual experimentation of the couple, the narrative seems to become more and more preoccupied with an object, tracing its origin, development and subsequent transformation. The object is, as the title of the book suggests, the eye. Roland Barthes, in his essay “Metaphor of the Eye” (1962), rightfully says,
"What happens to the Eye (and no longer to Marcelle, Simone, or the narrator) cannot be identified with ordinary fiction.”
He further argues that instead of working within a partial imaginary world where author’s imagination is bounded by the limitations of reality, Bataille straightaway creates a completely imaginary paradigm which lies far beyond reality. Barthes calls this poetic imagination. In this imaginary realm, the object, namely, the Eye, shifts paradigmatically from one substitutive object to another (eggs, testicles and other ovular objects) retaining its geometrical identity, but, at the same time, losing its functional one, behaving as a pure metaphor. There runs another stream, similar in nature and parallel to the aforementioned one. This is a series of liquid metaphors within the text, which flow through tears, cat's milk, egg yolks, frequent urination scenes, blood and semen. These two parallel streams are interdependent and interacts with each other as well.
According to Barthes, the narrative element of the novel, the story of the narrator and Simone, is just a literary mechanism to facilitate this smooth shifting of the underlying objects. As Barthes says in his essay—
“The narrative is only a kind of flowing matter, a vehicle for the precious metaphoric substance; if we are in a park at night, it is so that a thread of moonlight can turn translucent the moist patch of Marcelle’s sheet, which floats out the window of her room; if we are in Madrid, it is so that there can be a corrida, an offering of the bull’s testicles, the enucleation of Granero’s eye, and if in Seville, it is so that the sky there can express that yellowish liquid luminosity whose metaphoric nature we know by the rest of the chain…”
But, this analysis, though rigorous, doesn’t answer a rather simple question—why has such overtly sexual, if not pornographic, narrative been chosen as the carrier of the underlying metaphors? Or, rather, are we doing justice to the book by completely negating its narrative structure? What is the role of these erotic elements within the text?
If we closely follow the story, we’ll soon find out that, throughout the novel, sex and death, Eros and Thanatos, are irrevocably intertwined. Almost all the sexual encounters in the story culminate in either death or utter violence, be it Marcelle’s suicide, Granero’s death or strangulation of Don Aminado. The desperation of the couple to break free from their puritan parents, or at least to completely ignore them, quite categorically hints at the subversive urge of upturning the social taboos and stigmas, and also initiates a process of self-annihilation, the process of estranging oneself from his surroundings and coiling into a never-ending coition. It is far too similar to the state of ultimate bliss, or Nirvana, as prophesied by almost all the religions. But, this is only the beginning. Gradually, it dawns upon the reader that the entire erotic system established in the narrative, with all its rituals, fetishes and practices, is nothing but a primordial religion in itself. So, when the denouement comes with a blasphemous parody of the Catholic Eucharist involving desecration of the bread and wine using a dead priest’s urine and semen, it simply manifests the substitution of one fetishist system with another, substitution of Eucharist and consecrated hosts with eye, blood and semen. Therefore, the Barthesian shift of underlying metaphors finally surfaces and, in the process, engulfs those real metaphors (Eucharistic bread and wine), held so dear to Christianity.
Now, let us go back to our original question about the identity of “The Story of the Eye” as a pornographic fiction.
A truly great work of fiction always has the tendency to transgress. By transgression, I’m referring not only to transgressing the social norms, but also to transgressing the immediate literary genre within which it is operating. For example, Borges’ short story “Death and the Compass” apparently assumes the air of a detective fiction, but at the end, the story levitates to a metaphysical plane breaking loose from the confines of its immediate genre (i.e., detective fiction).
True, that Bataille works within the genre of pornography, utilising almost all of its tools (necrophilia, fetish, orgy etc.), but he also, at the same time, subverts it by the underlying maze of metaphors. The so-called pornographic infrastructure is necessary for him to explore the social taboos (also, the interrelation of sexual and religious fanaticism) and thereby transgressing them, but he never allows his readers to become too much engrossed in those superficialities, diverting their attention by the subliminal superstructure of metaphors and images. So, for Bataille, the use of pornography is, as Barthes suggests, a mere literary ploy, albeit a necessary one, but eventually his novel surpasses it.
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LibraryThing member multifaceted
This is another one of those books that gets more entertaining and memorable after you read it. When you read it the shock may be a bit disturbing and disgusting at first. But buying eggs will be an interesting experience for a long time; talk about bull fights and matadors will conjure up memories
Albeit, you might have to have a certain sort of morbid fascination and odd sense of humor to like it at all. Being from the internet generation, I've been subjected to millions of shock sites and descriptions of weird fetishes. This book, to me, is like those darkest dregs of the internet all compiled into one book and made eloquent. That's the best way I can explain it. I find it amazing that this book came from the early 1900s, because even today it still hasn't seemed to have lost any of its shock value (and I don't mean the trite, overused kind of shock imagery we're used to, either). There's no real plot to the book, and the main character doesn't even have a name... it's just an onslaught of strange, surreal, crazy events.
I guess Bataille has this odd view of sex: that the orgasm is like a "little death", and death and sex are interconnected somehow. This, in a way, explains the book. But it doesn't, really, because the connection between sex and death seems strange and foreign, even if you can understand things like the connections between pain and pleasure and the mechanics behind death erections. But with this book, Bataille makes me extremely interested in trying to figure his view out.
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of this book; and even hanging might take on an entirely new light. And that makes this book pretty awesome.Albeit, you might have to have a certain sort of morbid fascination and odd sense of humor to like it at all. Being from the internet generation, I've been subjected to millions of shock sites and descriptions of weird fetishes. This book, to me, is like those darkest dregs of the internet all compiled into one book and made eloquent. That's the best way I can explain it. I find it amazing that this book came from the early 1900s, because even today it still hasn't seemed to have lost any of its shock value (and I don't mean the trite, overused kind of shock imagery we're used to, either). There's no real plot to the book, and the main character doesn't even have a name... it's just an onslaught of strange, surreal, crazy events.
I guess Bataille has this odd view of sex: that the orgasm is like a "little death", and death and sex are interconnected somehow. This, in a way, explains the book. But it doesn't, really, because the connection between sex and death seems strange and foreign, even if you can understand things like the connections between pain and pleasure and the mechanics behind death erections. But with this book, Bataille makes me extremely interested in trying to figure his view out.
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LibraryThing member polusvijet
Essentially an edgy blogpost which probably served as blueprint for what was being posted on Tumblr around 2015.
LibraryThing member shawndotbailey
Caligula: I want a bedtime story.
Georges Bataille: Okay
Georges Bataille: Okay
LibraryThing member TakeItOrLeaveIt
Sexual debauchery at its finest and most French. My cup of tea.
LibraryThing member jvalka
Wow. This story hits fast and hard, being very short (between a short story and a novella) and directly written. It is all action, much of it graphic and brutal. At the end the narrator sees Marcelle's eye peering at him from out of Simone's vagina "through tears of urine" with streaks of semen
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giving the eye a "dreamy vision of disastrous sadness." It's this brief but powerful image that raises this up to the level of true art. The surreal imagery makes it closer to a pornographic prose poem than a true novel, as there really isn't any true plot or character development. This is a book that will always be shocking, much like Dali and Bunuel's Un chien andalou, which this reminds me of. Show Less
LibraryThing member the_terrible_trivium
A fast read (got through it in one sitting) and, er, I dunno. Smutty and violent and surreal and all, but it didn't really hit me with as much force as the material would warrant. The translation, maybe?
LibraryThing member poetontheone
A quick and slightly disturbing read full of beautifully crafted imagery and grotesque surrealism.
LibraryThing member Zohrab
The wierdest book I have ever read. I am not sure if I was amused, grossed out or engaged and mezmorized.
LibraryThing member perlle
Creative in its depiction of fetishes, but not a pleasant thing to read.
LibraryThing member CliffordDorset
Includes the essays: The Pornographic Imagination, by Sontag; and The Metaphor of the Eye, by Barthes
LibraryThing member shelle77
I found this book disturbing with no real idea of where it was going. It does call out to your darker side, the one that loves the perverse without wanting to acknowledge it. I read it for University, but I may have come across it eventually in my journey and still picked it up. It does stay with
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you for years after you read it. I read it around 6 years ago and still remember it very well. Not for the faint at heart. The question I suppose you have to asked yourself after reading it is: whether the author intended you to read meaning into the abstract images and underlying themes or whether he wanted to shock his reader and make them take a look at what in the book either disturbs or titillates them? Show Less
LibraryThing member a_n_itch
"...peculiarly satisfied with our mutual presences, akin to one another in the common isolation of lewdness, weariness, and absurdity."
LibraryThing member whitewavedarling
I had a difficult time getting through this book. In fact, I read the first fifteen pages or so, put it aside out of disgust, and then finally went back and finished it in one sitting--partly out of determination, partly out of curiosity, and partly because quotes on the back of my edition (from
It is shocking that this was published in 1928, but I'm not sure how much of the "art" of this work comes simply from the outright shock value of the work. At many points, I was more disgusted by the text than anything, and while this might be noted as an early hallmark of erotic literature, I'd be hardpressed to call it anything more than pornographic since I didn't see any of the subtlety or sensuality of language that I'd generally associate with erotica. And, there was nothing normal here. The work revolved around fetishistic and violent actions and reactions.
Had I known exactly what I was getting into, I might have read the short essay titled "W.C." that appears at the back of my edition, written by Bataille in regard to the writing/history of the text itself. Perhaps, I might have had some slight more appreciation for the art of the novel had I read that first...but I'm not sure, honestly. This wasn't badly written, but the material wasn't what I expected or would have sought out.
Simply, too each their own, and there may well be much merit in this work...and I'm just not seeing it. But, that said, I certainly wouldn't recommend it, groundbreaking and noteworthy text or not.
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Susan Sontag and Jean Paul Sartre) made me think that there just had to be something more to it if I kept going...It is shocking that this was published in 1928, but I'm not sure how much of the "art" of this work comes simply from the outright shock value of the work. At many points, I was more disgusted by the text than anything, and while this might be noted as an early hallmark of erotic literature, I'd be hardpressed to call it anything more than pornographic since I didn't see any of the subtlety or sensuality of language that I'd generally associate with erotica. And, there was nothing normal here. The work revolved around fetishistic and violent actions and reactions.
Had I known exactly what I was getting into, I might have read the short essay titled "W.C." that appears at the back of my edition, written by Bataille in regard to the writing/history of the text itself. Perhaps, I might have had some slight more appreciation for the art of the novel had I read that first...but I'm not sure, honestly. This wasn't badly written, but the material wasn't what I expected or would have sought out.
Simply, too each their own, and there may well be much merit in this work...and I'm just not seeing it. But, that said, I certainly wouldn't recommend it, groundbreaking and noteworthy text or not.
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LibraryThing member HadriantheBlind
Welp.
Not really a fan of transgressive fiction, but this one gets points for creativity. I had no idea that those body parts could be used in those ways.
Don't read while eating.
Not really a fan of transgressive fiction, but this one gets points for creativity. I had no idea that those body parts could be used in those ways.
Don't read while eating.
LibraryThing member amydross
Straining so hard to be deviant, it winds up merely silly. In a fictional world with no limits, where nothing is forbidden, this catalog of perversities turns out to be pretty dull. The ten pages or so of this edition that were not about sex did turn out to be interesting, though -- it's far more
Also, I really wish I had bothered to read this in French. A lot of the dirty terms felt off to me, and I wondered what they were in the original.
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worthwhile to read Bataille's self-analysis at the end than any of the self-conscious smut that came before.Also, I really wish I had bothered to read this in French. A lot of the dirty terms felt off to me, and I wondered what they were in the original.
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LibraryThing member danlai
This book is filthy, and not in the fun way. This is the most disturbing book I've ever read. It is as offensive as you can get, save for maybe incest, but even that wouldn't be too out of place in this book. It is 85 pages of fornication, masturbation, urinating, and something gross involving eggs
However, I couldn't put this book down, as much as I may have wanted to. It's the second half of the book that gets the most disturbing, but it also makes the most sense as to the point of this whole sad story. This book is something I cannot stop thinking about. I want to read it again, and maybe again after that.
I recommend this only to the brave and not to the faint of heart. The book is gross. If you can handle that, then read it.
Fun Fact: I checked this out from my school's library, and am now mortified I let this book be on my record. I don't recommend getting this from the library. I washed my hands after every single time I touched it.
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and eyes. It's anything BUT erotic.However, I couldn't put this book down, as much as I may have wanted to. It's the second half of the book that gets the most disturbing, but it also makes the most sense as to the point of this whole sad story. This book is something I cannot stop thinking about. I want to read it again, and maybe again after that.
I recommend this only to the brave and not to the faint of heart. The book is gross. If you can handle that, then read it.
Fun Fact: I checked this out from my school's library, and am now mortified I let this book be on my record. I don't recommend getting this from the library. I washed my hands after every single time I touched it.
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LibraryThing member soylentgreen23
Garish, but not pornographic; the essays that it comes with are useful resources that explain much of the significance of the text itself.
LibraryThing member adaorhell
the tension i felt in my own body is what made this so wonderful.
LibraryThing member .json
English teacher said it was important to read the bible to understand european literature, especially if you're not religious. It's important to read story of an eye to understand french literature, especially if you're not into watersports
LibraryThing member Andy_Dingley
Even with the Barthes essay (read that first, and knowledge_lost's review below), this can't raise itself above "an edgy blogpost", which these days you'd expect if you asked GPT to write something to offend 4chan. The writing process must have been something similar: no real narrative, certainly
The Sontag essay adds little, as it's primarily about a different text (The Story of O) and most of its points just can't be applied to a text as fragmented as this one.
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no "erotica", just choose the next phrase on the basis of what would be most outrageous.The Sontag essay adds little, as it's primarily about a different text (The Story of O) and most of its points just can't be applied to a text as fragmented as this one.
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LibraryThing member TTAISI-Editor
On the one hand, Bataille's short novel still retains some power to shock and disturb; its hyper-sexualized characters hardly make for blasé reading. On the other hand, its power is definitely muted by our hyper-sexualized society, in which women are often viewed as "Simone" was, namely a lovely
One thing is most definitely true: without an understanding of its early-20th century context, "The Story of the Eye" would make no sense!
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plaything for sex of all kinds, in which she is supposed to be (or claims to be) a more-than-willing participant. As for the power of the eye itself, this is best left to readers to uncover...One thing is most definitely true: without an understanding of its early-20th century context, "The Story of the Eye" would make no sense!
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LibraryThing member stephencbird
Before I read this work, I'd already read Bataille's "Erotism Death and Sensuality" (1957) ("EDAS") which amazed and confounded me. "Story of The Eye" ("SOTE") was written twenty-nine years before EDAS and yet the link between the two works is obvious. As other reviewers / critics have noted, it
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appears that Bataille ultimately derived his fully fleshed-out concepts (pun intended) from the ideas that are present in SOTE. This book ends up resembling a satire of pornography; it's so extreme as to be ridiculous. The reader is introduced to vaguely-sketched characters whose participation in drastic objectification overtakes their respective personalities. All of these "non-characters" are very young, precocious and seemingly lacking in innocence. They use each to other live out their fantasies, by means of bizarre fetishes, that fuel an ongoing excitement that inevitably doubles as torment. By doing so, the main players melt and meld into a Dionysian "oneness" where personality disappears and the reptile brain takes over. Within SOTE, the characters break away from the confines of any previous social conditioning. Nothing herein is appropriate; the artifice of civilized decorum plays no part in this work. The reader immediately becomes the "voyeur" in a world where behavior resulting from uninhibited sexual appetite can result in grave consequences -- Particularly within the context of transgression. In Closing: the moral of this story is: Since sexuality is amoral -- Anything goes. Although hopefully one can accept the fact that "anything goes" can be disgusting as well as inhuman. But to each his own: One man's / woman's revulsion is another's stimulation. Show Less
Subjects
Language
Original language
French
Original publication date
1928
1940 (revised)
Physical description
128 p.; 7.64 inches
ISBN
0140180095 / 9780140180091
Local notes
French title: Histoire de l'oeil, 1928 (Story of the Eye) (under pseudonym of Lord Auch)