Portal:Pornography/Featured erotica/18

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Josephine Mutzenbacher - The Life Story of a Viennese Whore, as Told by Herself is an erotic novel first published anonymously in Vienna, Austria in 1906. The novel is famous for over 100 years and sold over 3 million copies.

Although no author claimed responsibility for the work, it was originally attributed to either Felix Salten or Arthur Schnitzler by the Librarians at the University of Vienna. Today, critics, scholars, academics and the Austrian Government designate Salten, author of the book "Bambi, A Life in the Woods" (which Walt Disney purchased in 1942 and made into the world famous animated cartoon "Bambi") as the sole author of the "pornographic classic" Josephine Mutzenbacher. The novel has been translated into English, French, Spanish, Hungarian and Japanese, and been the subject of numerous films, theater productions, parodies, and university courses, as well as two sequels.

The plot device employed in Josephine Mutzenbacher is that of first-person narrative, structured in the format of a memoir. The story is told from the point of view of an accomplished aging 50-year-old Viennese courtesan who is looking back upon the sexual escapades she enjoyed during her unbridled youth in Vienna. Contrary to the what the title indicates, the entirety of the book takes place when Josephine is between the ages of 5-12 years old, before she actually becomes a licensed prostitute in the brothels of Vienna. The book begins when she is five years old and ends when she is twelve years old and about to enter professional service in a brothel. Although the book makes use of many "euphemisms" for human anatomy and sexual behavior that seem quaint today, its content is entirely pornographic and unmistakably deviant in nature. The actual progression of events amounts to little more than a graphic, unapologetic description of the reckless sexuality exhibited by the heroine, all before reaching her 13th year. The style bears more than a passing resemblance to the Marquis de Sade's The 120 Days of Sodom in its unabashed "laundry list" cataloging of all manner of taboo sexual antics from incest, rape and homosexuality to child prostitution, group sex and fellatio. (read more . . . )