Mary Gaitskill: belief

Transcript context

…Sure. I love that book. It’s one of my favorites. Lady Dedlock is a very erotic figure. Her intense female strength, her intense masking, the idea that she’s always hiding something. She’s like a Diana Rigg figure in The Avengers — Emma Peel. Older people might get that reference. She’s super elegant. The lawyer, the guy — Tulkinghorn, I think his name is — who decides to expose her, like their conversation is quite highly eroticized in a S&M way. I’m trying to think of somebody else. The name is escaping me. Edith Wharton. One of her books, I remember, House of Mirth, the interplay between the male characters and the female heroine. Definitely, you get a sense of masculine power and feminine response, which is, I remember, being subtly eroticized. Henry James — oh my goodness. Everybody knows Turn of the Screw is heavily eroticized. I think there’s quite a lot you can do with very subtle means without overtly referring to sexuality. Do you ever read children’s books?…

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