Sexual Personae: Art & Decadence from Nefertiti to Emily Dickinson

Here is the fiery, provocative, and unparalleled work of feminist art criticism that launched Camille Paglia's exceptional career as one of our most important public intellectuals. Is Emily Dickinson "the female Sade"? Is Donatello's David a bit of pedophile pornography? What is the secret kinship between Byron and Elvis Presley, between Medusa and Madonna? How do liberals and feminists--as well as conservatives--fatally misread human nature? This audacious and omnivorously learned work of guerrilla scholarship offers nothing less than a unified-field theory of Western culture, high and low, since Egyptians invented beauty--making a persuasive case for all art as a pagan battleground between male and female, form and chaos, civilization and daemonic nature.

47 photographs.

Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 08/20/1991
ISBN: 9780679735793
Pages: 736
Weight: 1.51lbs
Size: 8.02h x 5.22w x 1.52d

Review Citations: Booklist 10/15/1994 pg. 370
Booklist Editors Choice/Adult 01/15/1995 pg. 852