Seductress (49 page)

22
Pollsters find epidemic . . . :
Quilliam,
Women on Sex,
31 and 18. Books like
Women and Self-Esteem
lead women’s studies’ reading lists, and Gloria Steinem’s
Revolution from Within
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1992) finds a plague of low sense of self among American women. She observes that wherever she “traveled [she] saw women who were smart, courageous, or valuable, who didn’t think they were smart, courageous, or valuable,” 3.

In one study of college seniors, twice as many women as men rate themselves below average sexually; none say they’re above average. Ellyn Kaschak,
Engendered Lives: A New Psychology of Women’s Experience
(New York: Basic Books, 1992), 162, and Janus and Janus,
Janus Report,
93.

22
Georg Simmel observed . . . :
Georg Simmel, “Flirtation,”
Georg Simmel: On Women, Sexuality, and Love,
ed. Guy Oakes (New Haven: Yale University Press [1911], 1984), 141.

22
His feminist contemporary . . . :
See Ellen Key,
Love and Ethics
and Robert T. Michael et al.,
Sex in America
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1994), 130.

23
Activists say that . . . :
Amber Hollibaugh, “Desire for the Future: Radical Hope in Passion and Pleasure,”
Pleasure and Danger: Exploring Female Sexuality,
ed. Carole S. Vance (Boston: Routledge, 1984), 407.

23
We’re naturally magnetized . . . :
Ernest Becker,
The Denial of Death
(New York: Free Press, 1973), 135, and Sartre,
Being and Nothingness,
454-55.

23
But the sexy . . . :
Patricia Seller, “Women, Sex and Power,”
Fortune
(August 5, 1996), 46.

24
Robert Graves believed . . . :
Quoted in Elizabeth Gould Davis,
The First Sex
(New York: Putnam’s, 1971), 72.

26
They “take hold . . .”:
Neumann,
Great Mother,
8.

26
Some scholars contend . . . :
This is one of the most heated, acrimonious issues in archaeological and women’s studies today. Charlotte Allen summarizes the dispute in “The Scholars and the Goddess,”
Atlantic Monthly
(January 2001), 18-22. Important voices arguing against either a goddess religion or prehistorical matriarchy are Cynthia Eller,
The Myth of Matriarchal Prehistory
(Boston: Beacon, 2000); Philip G. Davis,
Goddess Unmasked: The Rise of Neopagan Feminist Spirituality
(Dallas: Spence Publishing, 1998); Ian Hodder, “The Past as Passion and Play: Catalhoyuk as a Site of Conflict in the Construction of Multiple Pasts,”
Archaeology Under Fire: Politics, Nationalism, and Heritage in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East,
ed. Lynn Meskell (London: Routledge, 1998); and Lynn Meskell, “Goddesses, Gimbutas, and ‘New Age’ Archaeology,”
Antiquity
69 (1995), 74-86.

Major spokespeople for the other side include Marija Gimbutas,
The Gods and Goddesses of Old Europe
(Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1982); Riane Eisler,
The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future
(San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1987); Riane Eisler,
Sacred Pleasure: Sex, Myth, and the Politics of the Body: New Paths to Power and Love
(San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1995); Elinor W. Gadon,
The Once and Future Goddess
(San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1989); Buffie Johnson,
Lady of the Beasts: The Goddess and Her Sacred Animals
(Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions International, 1994); Judith Yarnall,
Transformations of Circe: The History of an Enchantress
(Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1994), Jean Markale,
The Great Goddess,
trans. Jody Gladding (Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions International, 1999); and Gerda Lerner,
The Creation of Patriarchy
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), 141-60.

One of the most cautious prehistorians, Margaret Ehrenberg, ultimately concedes that the Venus figurines “strongly suggest a common meaning and linked social or religious tradition throughout Europe,”
Women in Prehistory
(Norman and London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989), 72.

27
Historian Richard Rudgley . . . :
Richard Rudgley,
The Lost Civilizations of the Stone Age
(New York: Touchstone, 1999), 199.

27
Most mythologic systems . . . :
For a discussion of this, see Joseph Campbell,
The Masks of the God: Primitive Mythology
(New York: Penguin, 1959), 315; Shahrukh Husain,
The Goddess
(London: Duncan Baird, 1997), 42-72; and Davis,
First Sex,
15-85 and passim.

27
This ur-divinity, by . . . :
Neumann,
Great Mother,
18.

27
Her double D breasts . . . :
Quoted in Rudgley,
Lost Civilizations,
198.

27
To our ancestors . . . :
Scholar Paul Friedrich believes the synthesis of maternity and sexuality makes women too powerful sexually; ergo it has been suppressed in patriarchy. See chapter 9, “Sex/Sensuousness and Maternity/ Motherliness,”
Meaning of Aphrodite,
181-91.

27
Another queen-size goddess . . . :
Joseph Campbell, quoted in Gadon,
Once and Future Goddess,
14.

28
To the Ice Age . . . :
Many believe lunar notations led to the achievements of astronomy, mathematics, writing, and agriculture and taught
Homo sapiens
to think abstractly. For a discussion of this, see Baring and Cashford,
Myth of the Goddess,
20-21.

28
With her, “there . . .”:
Gimbutas,
Language of the Goddess,
321.

28
Though better known . . . :
Campbell,
Masks of the God,
313.

28
From the scenarios . . . :
Taylor,
Prehistory of Sex,
133.

29
Which meant they . . . :
François Boucher,
20,000 Years of Fashion
(New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1965), 23.

29
Stone Age women . . . :
See ibid., 26-30, for more detail on this. Also see Rudgley’s description of the elaborate beaded costumes of Paleolithic man,
Lost Civilizations,
190, and E. O. James, who describes two Stone Age frescoes of women dancing in caps, skirts, and “wide skirts of crinoline type,” on an Alpera rock shelter.
From Cave to Cathedral
(London: Thames & Hudson, 1965), 31.

29
They were in . . . :
Norman Rush,
Mating
(New York: Vintage, 1991), 199.

29
Underscoring the archaic . . . :
On the presence of pain in passion, see the work of Robert J. Stoller, M.D.,
Sexual Excitement: The Dynamics of Erotic Life
(New York: Touchstone, 1979) and
Observing the Erotic Imagination
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1985). Amorists eloquent on this topic include: Capellanus,
Art of Courtly Love,
2, 26-27, 54; and Stendhal,
Love,
47, 211, 250, and 257. “There is a delicious pleasure,” Stendhal writes, “in clasping in your arms a woman who has caused you much suffering,” 211. See also Denis de Rougemont,
Love in the Western World,
trans. Montgomery Belgion (New York: Harper & Row, 1956), 243; Maurois, “The Art of Loving,” 15; Balzac,
Physiology of Marriage,
41; Van de Velde,
Ideal Marriage,
19-20, and 110; Person,
Dreams of Love,
65 and 74; and penultimately, Ellis, “Love and Pain,”
Psychology of Sex,
vol. 1, 66-188.

29
As eros evolved . . . :
Hermann Kern,
Through the Labyrinth
(New York: Prestel, 2000), 30.

30
“Sex,” in essence . . . :
Paglia,
Sexual Personae,
91.

30
When the hero . . . :
Philip Roth,
Sabbath’s Theater
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1995), 5.

30
One of her . . . :
Baring and Cashford,
Myth of the Goddess,
264.

30
But she’s a . . . :
Ibid., 109. This recapitulation may be due to a land bridge that once connected Crete to Old Europe.

30
It was a . . . :
Gimbutas,
Language of the Goddess,
121.

30
At the deepest . . . :
Neumann,
Great Mother,
18.

31
But the “glorification . . .”:
Jacquetta Hawkes,
Dawn of the Gods
(New York: Random House, 1968), 131.

31
Art, for the . . . :
Quoted ibid., 73.

32
Just as the . . . :
Ibid., 137.

32
Through cultic magic . . . :
Baring and Cashford,
Myth of the Goddess,
66.

32
To the hypnotic . . . :
Karl Kerenyi,
Goddesses of the Sun and Moon,
trans. Murray Stein (Dallas: Spring Publications, 1979), 49.

33
As before, pain . . . :
See Rodney Castleden who, countering the hearts-and-flowers view of the Cretans, comments on the “disturbing” Minoan obsession with the “shedding of blood,” and discusses the possibility of human sacrifice.
Minoans: Life in Bronze Age Crete
(London: Routledge, 1990), 169. Montaigne, “On Some Verses of Virgil,”
Complete Essays,
3 and 72.

34
Above her shines . . . :
Barbara G. Walker,
The Woman’s Dictionary of Symbols and Sacred Objects
(San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1988), 370.

34
Like them, she . . . :
Betty De Shong Meador,
Inanna: Lady of the Largest Heart
(Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000), 12 and 91.

34
She is known . . . :
Tikva Frymer-Kensky,
In the Wake of the Goddess
(New York: Free Press, 1992), 29.

35
Perpetuating the twin-sexed . . . :
Meador,
Inanna,
162.

35
After she crowned . . . :
Wolkstein and Kramer,
Inanna,
12.

35
Then she set . . . :
Meador,
Inanna,
159 and 161.

35
She bragged to . . . :
Quoted in Baring and Cashford,
Myth of the Goddess,
214 and 37.

35
She was the deity . . . :
Wolkstein and Kramer,
Inanna,
6 and 24.

36
During her ordeal . . . :
Ibid., 60.

36
She seized the . . . :
Meador,
Inanna,
114-15.

36
She was the quintessential . . . :
Beverly Moon, “Inanna: The Star Who Became Queen,”
Goddesses Who Rule,
ed. Elisabeth Benard and Beverly Moon (New York: Oxford University Press, 2000), 77.

36
Earthly wisdom became . . . :
Wolkstein and Kramer,
Inanna,
15.

36
Included in the package . . . :
Ibid., 15 and 48.

37
Her hair—a huge turn-on . . . :
Samuel Noah Kramer,
History Begins at Sumer
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1981), 18.

37
Once within the high altar . . . :
Wolkstein and Kramer,
Inanna,
38 and 39.

37
Possessed by their goddess . . . :
Frymer-Kensky,
Wake of the Goddess,
48.

38
They limited her . . . :
Friedrich,
Meaning of Aphrodite,
62.

39
She was a walking . . . :
Ibid., 94.

39
She inspired art . . . :
Rufus C. Camphausen,
The Encyclopedia of Erotic Wisdom
(Rochester, Vt.: Inner Traditions International, 1991), 14.

39
Attended by bees . . . :
Homer, “Hymn to Aphrodite,”
The Homeric Hymns,
trans. Charles Boer (Chicago: Swallow Press, 1970), 75. See Friedrich’s interesting discussion of this combined sexual and maternal aspect in Aphrodite in chapter 9,
Meaning of Aphrodite.
He points out that the union of these two qualities confers too much power on women and has therefore been suppressed throughout later history, 181-91.

39
Despite the loss . . . :
Homer, “Hymn to Aphrodite,” 81, and Bruce S. Thornton,
Eros: The Myth of Ancient Greek Sexuality
(Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1997), 51.

39
Like her prehistoric . . . :
Kerenyi, “Aphrodite,”
Goddesses of Sun and Moon,
59.

39
With divine variability . . . :
Quoted in Thornton,
Eros,
52.

40
Although the Greeks . . . :
Ibid., 50.

40
Sculptors subjected her . . . :
Quoted in Will Durant,
The Life of Greece
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1939), 313. Neither the prehistoric cultures nor the Cretans nor the Sumerians and Babylonians invested their sex goddesses with symmetrical proportions and rosebud lips. Their deities instead flaunted exaggerated primary sex characteristics, and even the Minoan Snake Goddess looked numinous, glamorous, and formidable rather than aesthetically pleasing.

As Freud and others have pointed out, beauty is an Apollonian defense mechanism against women’s fearful sexual powers. See Friedrich,
Meaning of Aphrodite,
88, and Sigmund Freud,
Civilization and Its Discontents,
trans. Joan Riviere (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1930), 25, in which he calls beauty “aim-inhibited sexuality.”

Rita Freedman also analyzes this: “Beauty safely conceals women’s frightening dimensions.”
Beauty Bound
(Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books, 1986), 61, as does Camille Paglia at length in
Sexual Personae.
“Beauty is an Apollonian freeze-frame,” she explains, that “halts and condenses the flux and indeterminacy of nature,” by which she means woman’s “billowy body,” which reflects the “surging sea of chthonian nature,” 30 and 32.