The little death

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The little death is a translation from the French "la petite mort" (Le Petit Mort/Le Petit Morte/La petite morte), a popular reference for a sexual orgasm. The term has generally been interpreted to describe the postorgasmic fainting spells^[1] some lovers suffer from. Also it can refer to spiritual release that come with orgasm, or a short period of transendence, an expenditure or spending of life force.

Speculations to its origin include current connotations of the phrase, including

Greco-Roman belief that the oversecretion of bodily fluids would "dry out" one of the believed four humours, leading to death
Islam's reference to sleep

1 Popular culture
2 Further reading
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Popular culture

The Little Death[1] is an disco/electro band from Toronto.
There is a London based band called Little Death [2]
+44 wrote a song called "Little Death." It appears on their debut album When Your Heart Stops Beating.
Erin McKeown sings a song called "La Petite Mort." It appears on her 2000 album Distillation.
Lemony Snicket lists "la petite morte" as an example of a french phrase in The Carnivorous Carnival, the ninth book in A Series of Unfortunate Events.
Korn wrote a song titled "Last Legal Drug (Le Petit Mort)" on their album See You on the Other Side
Cassandra Wilson wrote a song called "A Little Warm Death" referring to orgasm on her 1995 album New Moon Daughter.
The Webcomic El Kiablo has a cartoon about this phrase.[3]
Stars perform a song titled "Petite Mort" on the Petite Mort single.
Ammonia produced a song called "Little Death" on their 1995 album Mint 400, featuring sexually explicit background noises.
W.A.S.P. wrote the song "Little Death" in on their 1997 album Kill Fuck Die.
The Odds have a song called "The Little Death" on their 1993 album Bedbugs.

[edit] Further reading

Psychobiology of altered states of consciousness, Psychological Bulletin 2005, Vol. 131, No. 1, 98-127
Orgasmic aura originates from the right hemisphere, Neurology 2002;58:302-304