The Sunday Times
"This hideously decadent fin-de-siecle novel by the French anarchist Mirbeau has become an underground classic. ... There are satirical and allegorical dimensions, but it remains irreducibly horrible."

Book Description
Novel. "This hideously decadent fin-de-siecle novel by the French anarchist Mirbeau has become an underground classic... There are satirical and allegorical dimensions, but it remains irreducibly horrible"-The Sunday Times. First published in 1898, the decadent classic Oscar Wilde recommended as "revolting...a sort of grey adder" is available in a new edition from Dedalus, translated by Michael Richardson and with an introduction by Brian Stableford. The century that has passed since its first publication has done nothing to tame the book that, in Anne Billson's words, "flays civilised society down to its hypocritical bones and is le dernier cri in kinky eroticism."

Language Notes
Text: English (translation)
Original Language: French

Download Description
Following the twin trails of desire and depravity to a shocking, sadistic paradise - a garden in China where torture is practiced as an art form - a dissolute Frenchman discovers the true depths of degradation beyond his prior bourgeois imaginings. Entranced by a resolute Englishwoman whose capacity for debauchery knows no bounds, he capitulates to her every whim amid an ecstatic yet tormenting incursion of visions, scents, caresses, pleasures, horrors, and fantastic atrocities. The Torture Garden is exceptional for its detailed descriptions of sexual euphoria and exquisite torture, its political critique of government corruption and bureaucracy, and its revolutionary portrait of a woman - which challenges even contemporary models of feminine authority. This is one of the most truly original works ever imagined. Beyond providing richly poetic experience, it will stimulate anyone interested in the always-contemporary problem of the limits of experience and sensation. As part of the continuing struggle against censorship and especially self-censorship, it will remain a landmark in the fight against all that would suppress the creation of a far freer world. Written in 1899, this fabulously rare novel was once described as "the most sickening work of art of the 19th century."

FROM THE PUBLISHER

A gothic classic about the art of torture as practiced in a fantastic 19th century torture garden. Will sicken, deprave and delight modern readers.

SYNOPSIS

First published in 1898, this decadent classic Oscar Wilde recommended as "revolting...a sort of grey adder" is once again available from SPD.

FROM THE CRITICS

Sunday Times