Gor-blimey.

[bellatrys]

I didn't notice this at first, but in the details of the publication info on Amazon is the niggling little fact that Witlness of Gor is a staggering 717 pages (as well as hardcover.)

By way of comparison, Great Expectations is only 448 pages in the Penguin edition and Hugo's Bellringer only 510. This is literally half as large as War & Peace,

Comments

[lonesomepioneer]

Oh, God, Quo Vadis, my horrible, horrible guilty pleasure from sixth grade. In my defense, I was a thoroughly brainwashed little fundamentalist Christian at the time, and the conjunction of Holy Christian Martyrdom and Freaky Kinky Slavefic was completely irresistible: I could get turned on and feel self-righteous about it! My favorite was the subplot with Eunice and Petronius Arbiter, though even I found it lame when she killed herself in his dying arms rather than inherit all his estates and fortunes and everything. I mean, if you must fall in love with your decadent hedonist objectifying Roman master, at least reap the benefits when he kills himself to avoid being executed for sedition, right? Even the whores in that book were self-sacrificing little virgins in the end. :P

There could have been more hot boy slaves, too. All the male slaves were either freakish simpleton man-mountain Lenny-from-Of Mice and Men, or evil traitorous little old men, or some such. Come on, scenes illustrating terrible sinful Roman decadence, give

that's the right icon, too!

[bellatrys]

Holy Christian Martyrdom and Freaky Kinky Slavefic was completely irresistible:

For an awful lot of Americans, for a very long time!

Even the whores in that book were self-sacrificing little virgins in the end. :P

Ayup!

There could have been more hot boy slaves, too.

Double yup! The old Sword & Sandal flicks were okay with the lesbianism = awesome! Ebol!, but not TEH GAY (at least not overtly). Nothing to do with the manstream target audience, of course.

Re: that's the right icon, too!

[fledgist]

As, ahem, Gore Vidal has pointed out there's gay subtext intentionally put into Ben Hur, though the VERY MANLY Charlton Heston, whose gun is big, insists otherwise.

Re: that's the right icon, too!

[rozasharn]

According to 'The Celluloid Closet', everybody knew at the time that Charlton Heston wouldn't stand for any such goings-on. So when whoever-it-was came up with the idea to have the two male characters be former lovers, the director said "Heston would never agree" and the actor playing the other guy said, "I'll do it. I'll render all the nuances in my acting, and we just won't tell him." ---Or words to that effect; I saw it once years ago.

Re: that's the right icon, too!

[fledgist]

Yup, that's the story I read in Vidal's memoir *Palimpsest*.

[voxwoman]

Mine was "Whom the Gods Would Destroy" a racy pulp about the Trojan War. I forget who wrote it. But there was BDSM, sex, and violence aplenty...