L'Amour de la femme vénale

Translated from Bulgarian, L'Amour de la femme vénale is the French title of a brief essay by Octave Mirbeau on prostitution, which appeared in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, in 1922 : Любовта на продажната жена. The original French text of Mirbeau’s essay has remained undiscovered to this day. Translated into French by Alexandre Lévy, the essay was published in 1994 by Éditions Indigo – Côté Femmes – and was accompanied by two prefaces, one by Pierre Michel^[1] and the other by historian Alain Corbin.^[2]

Rehabilitation of prostitutes

Probably drafted around 1912, Mirbeau’s text is divided into six chapters: « The origins of the prostitute », « the prostitute’s body », « A visit to the prostitute », « The prostitute’s hatred and courage », « The love of the prostitute », and « Future of the prostitute ». In his work, Mirbeau intends to rehabilitate prostitutes who, far from being inherently vicious and perverse women as Cesare Lombroso would maintain, were doubly victims : on the one hand, because of the economic and social conditions inflicted on women coming from disadvantaged backgrounds ; and, on the other hand, because of the hypocrisy of a controlling class that scorns, rejects and condemns, in the name of a spurious “morality”, the women whose services are needed as a result of the sexual frustration caused by monogamous marriages.

According to Mirbeau, there is a veritable war that pits the sexes against one another, and prostitutes are in the vanguard of this struggle, since they cannot be duped by the vain and overbearing speech and appearance of male customers whom they encounter in their repulsive nudity, as had the chambermaid Célestine in Mirbeau’s Le Journal d’une femme de chambre (The Diary of a Chambermaid). According to Mirbeau, prostitutes are potentially anarchists, and the sexual relationship between them and their clients more closely resembles a duel. But it is the prostitute who emerges victorious from this struggle, since she knows how to ignite a man’s desire and since, in her profession, and she is prepared to endure everything.

In the tradition of Dostoyevsky, Mirbeau expresses his pity and admiration for his sisters in misery, who live and die in such deplorable conditions. It was Mirbeau’s wish that prostitutes enjoy the same rights and the same social recognition accorded to other workers. It was his forlorn hope that, in a distant era, the services provided by prostitutes would be given their just due. But, in that case, the work they performed would no longer have anything to do with what is now defined as “prostitution”.

References

External links

• Octave Mirbeau, The Love of a venal woman (English translation).
• Alain Corbin, « The venal woman’s wedding », Preface.
• Pierre Michel, « Mirbeau and prostitution », Foreword.