Il giudice beffato

by Marquis de Sade, Lucia Tozzi (Editor), Remo Ceserani (Contributor)

«Anche là dove si sente che il marchese si appoggia a qualche trovata narrativa tradizionale (i letti che si sfasciano sotto il peso dell'innamorato impaziente, la caduta boccaccesca del signor di Fontanis nel brago dei porci, la farsa degli spiriti nel castello infestato e così via), si avverte che l'odio diviene ispirazione creativa e suggerisce una quantità straordinaria di invenzioni metaforiche e verbali, tutte a spese della povera vittima - uno zotico giudice di provincia che pretende di impalmare un fiore di fanciulla innamorata - che viene di volta in volta graffiato, frustato, spennacchiato, smerdato, o a spese della magistratura, della società o della storia di Provenza che anche là dove quasi non c'entrano, si prendono la loro parte di critica».
Remo Ceserani

139 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2002

About the author

A preoccupation with sexual violence characterizes novels, plays, and short stories that Donatien Alphonse François, comte de Sade but known as marquis de Sade, of France wrote. After this writer derives the word sadism, the deriving of sexual gratification from fantasies or acts that involve causing other persons to suffer physical or mental pain.

This aristocrat, revolutionary politician, and philosopher exhibited famous libertine lifestyle.

His works include dialogues and political tracts; in his lifetime, he published some works under his own name and denied authorship of apparently anonymous other works. His best erotic works combined philosophical discourse with pornography and depicted fantasies with an emphasis on criminality and blasphemy against the Catholic Church. Morality, religion or law restrained not his "extreme freedom." Various prisons and an insane asylum incarcerated the aristocrat for 32 years of his life: ten years in the Bastile, another year elsewhere in Paris, a month in Conciergerie, two years in a fortress, a year in Madelonnettes, three years in Bicêtre, a year in Sainte-Pélagie, and 13 years in the Charenton asylum. During the French revolution, people elected this criminal as delegate to the National Convention. He wrote many of his works in prison.