I spent a lot of time with erotic classics back in the day. You know, Fanny Hill, The Story of O, Justine, et al. Leopold von Sacher-Masoch’s Venus in Furs, was obviously de rigeur, for a young kinkster studying the canon yet it made less than a favorable impression the first time around. In the early 90s, I said:
Although many of the clichés of BDSM stem from this famous work, it focuses … solely on power exchange. One supposes that our hero Severin is aroused by being enslaved to his idol Wanda, but the book makes no mention of this. Still, it is well-written and the head games encourage one to take an interest in the fate of these very autobiographical characters. A[n] educational read for the more straightlaced (pronounced vanilla) members of the population.
In other words: von Sacher-Masoch got a big old “meh”.
Yet when British femdom artist Sardax kindly provided a chance to review his new illustrated translation of this German novella, I was intrigued to see how it would come across.
My verdict?
In short, the translation, the art, and the care with which this edition of Venus in Furs was put together allowed a much greater appreciation of the the novel, in fact, I enjoyed this version so much that it’s one of the crown jewels of my erotic archive. And this is not faint praise. I own a lot of dirty books.
That summary was for the tl;dr crowd. For everyone else, here are the deets.
Examining this book was like undressing a lover. I took off the dust jacket to spare it while reading, not wanting to ruin the matte finish with any oils from my skin. Beneath this layer, the volume was black with debossed silver lettering in Times New Roman or some similarly elegant font that — like Wanda von Dunajew herself — brooked no disobedience.
Between covers, the judicious use of white space, highlighted both the watercolors and the text, making for a delightfully easy read. At the end of each chapter there was even a charming glyph of a single-tail curled, catlike, around itself. New chapters always began on a lefthand page. Layout like this is a nearly forgotten art, and it was a real pleasure to experience this again.
There was still no sex in Venus in Furs and yet this time around I didn’t mind because sensuality was everywhere and Sardax really highlighted this with his art. His textures were so rich; one could almost feel the caress of the silks and woolens, the brocades, and especially the furs. Sardax’s palette also seemed warmer than in his other work online. To me, it just highlighted the cosiness of Severin and Wanda’s must have experienced at their Carpathian spa with the fire crackling and winter just outside, or their richly appointed carriage bound for Florence. 
And although the illustrations were decidedly erotic, they are at most a hard PG, since nipple nor ‘nad ever showed. This complemented von Sacher-Masoch’s suggestive, but not explicit. nineteenth century text, and even Severin’s desires. He wanted to be utterly controlled by Wanda. Sex was an afterthought.
German, incidentally, is not the sexiest of languages. You can easily sound like you’re cussing someone out while murmuring the most tender of endearments. The German text of Venus Im Pelz is in the public domain, so it wasn’t hard to compare the original with what Sardax and the pseudonymous “Fernanda Savage”, whose translation first crossed my path, had accomplished. In every case, Sardax won. He made German sexy, for one thing. The vague literary references that would only be of interest to a stuffy European were also gone and the discussions — of art, of philosophy, of ancient myths — were presented in such a way as to make them accessible to a modern audience.
Thus, I recommend this edition of Venus in Furs without reservation. It is lovingly presented by a kinkster, for kinksters and, all puns aside, you can’t beat that.
Click to embiggen these lovely inline images courtesy of Sardax.
