Editing Orgasm (section)

== Literature ==

[[File:Jupiter and Juno - Annibale Carracci - 1597 - Farnese Gallery, Rome.jpg|thumb|''[[Jupiter (mythology)|Jupiter]] and [[Juno (mythology)|Juno]]'', by [[Annibale Carracci]]]]

Orgasm has been widely described in literature over the centuries. In antiquity, [[Latin literature]] addressed the subject as much as [[Greek literature]]: Book III of [[Ovid]]'s ''[[Metamorphoses]]'' retells a discussion between [[Jove]] and [[Juno (mythology)|Juno]], in which the former states: "The sense of pleasure in the male is far / More dull and dead than what you females share."<ref>[[Ovid]], ''[[Metamorphoses|Met]].'' III, 320-21 (translated by Sir Samuel Garth, [[John Dryden]], et al, 1717). In the original in [[Latin]], Ovid writes: ''maior vestra profecto est, / quam quae contingit maribus.''</ref> Juno rejects this thought; they agree to ask the opinion of [[Tiresias]] ("who had known [[Venus (mythology)|Venus]]/Love in both ways," having lived seven years as a female).<ref>''Met''. III, 323 (translated by [[A. S. Kline]], 2000).</ref> Tiresias offends Juno by agreeing with Jove, and she strikes him blind on the spot (Jove lessens the blow by giving Tiresias the gift of foresight, and long life).<ref>''Met.'' III, 335.</ref> Earlier, in the ''[[Ars Amatoria]]'', Ovid states that he abhors sexual intercourse that fails to complete both partners.<ref>{{in lang|pt}} ''Jornal de Letras, Artes e Ideias'', Ano XXV/Number 930. May 24 to June 6, 2006.</ref>

The theme of orgasm survived during [[Romanticism]] and is incorporated in many [[Homoeroticism|homoerotic]] works. In ''FRAGMENT: Supposed to be an Epithalamium of Francis Ravaillac and Charlotte Cordé'', [[Percy Bysshe Shelley]], "a translator of extraordinary range and versatility",<ref>Webb, 1976, p. 2.</ref> wrote the phrase "No life can equal such a death." That phrase has been seen as a metaphor for orgasm,<ref name="Lauritsen">"[http://paganpressbooks.com/jpl/HHREV3.HTM Hellenism and Homoeroticism in Shelley and his Circle] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080708193419/http://paganpressbooks.com/jpl/HHREV3.HTM |date=July 8, 2008 }}", by John Lauritsen (2008). Consulted on December 10, 2009.</ref> and it was preceded by the rhythmic urgency of the previous lines "Suck on, suck on, I glow, I glow!", which has been seen as alluding to [[fellatio]].<ref name="Lauritsen" /> For Shelley, orgasm was "the almost involuntary consequences of a state of abandonment in the society of a person of surpassing attractions".<ref>Plato, 2001.</ref> [[Edward Ellerker Williams]], the last love of Shelley's life, was remembered by the poet in "The Boat on the Serchio", which has been considered as possibly "the grandest portrayal of orgasm in literature":<ref name="Lauritsen" /> Shelley, in this poem, associates orgasm with death when he writes "the death which lovers love".<ref name="Lauritsen" /> In [[French literature]], the term ''[[la petite mort]]'' (the little death) is a famous [[euphemism]] for orgasm;<ref>{{Cite journal |vauthors = Georgiadis J, Kortekaas R, Kuipers R, Nieuwenburg A, Pruim J, Reinders A, Holstege G |title = Regional cerebral blood flow changes associated with clitorally induced orgasm in healthy women |journal = Eur J Neurosci |volume = 24 |issue = 11 |pages = 3305–16 |date = 2006 |pmid = 17156391 |doi = 10.1111/j.1460-9568.2006.05206.x |s2cid = 15731161 |doi-access = free }}</ref> it is the representation of the man who forgets himself and the world during orgasm. [[Jorge Luis Borges]], in the same vision, wrote in one of the several [[footnote]]s of "[[Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius]]" that one of the churches of [[Tlön]] claims [[Platonism|Platonic]]ally that "All men, in the vertiginous moment of coitus, are the same man. All men who repeat a line from [[Shakespeare]] ''are'' William Shakespeare."<ref>Borges, ''Ficciones'', p.28</ref> Shakespeare himself was knowledgeable of this idea: lines "I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thy eyes" and "I will die bravely, like a smug bridegroom", said respectively by [[Benedick]] in ''[[Much Ado About Nothing]]'' and by King Lear in [[King Lear|the play of that ilk]],<ref>''MUCH ADO'', v ii 99–101. & ''Lear'', iv vi 201.</ref> is interpreted as "to die in a woman's lap" = "to experience a sexual orgasm".<ref>Partridge, 2001, p.118.</ref> 

Freud with his psychoanalytic projects, in ''[[The Ego and the Id]]'' (1923), speculates that sexual satisfaction by orgasm make [[Eros]] ("life instinct") exhausted and leaves the field open to [[Thanatos]] ("death instinct"), in other words, with orgasm Eros fulfills its mission and gives way to Thanatos.<ref>See [[Sigmund Freud|Freud, Sigmund]]. ''The Ego and the Id''. The Hogarth Press Ltd. London, 1949. Quoted by ''Vida Íntima: Enciclopédia do Amor e do Sexo'', Abril Cultural, Vol. 1, 1981, [[São Paulo]], Brazil, p. 66-67.</ref> Other modern authors have chosen to represent the orgasm without metaphors. In the novel ''[[Lady Chatterley's Lover]]'' (1928), by [[D. H. Lawrence]], we can find an explicit narrative of a sexual act between a couple: "As he began to move, in the sudden helpless orgasm there awoke in her strange thrills rippling inside her..."<ref>[[D. H. Lawrence]], New York: Grove Press, 1969, cited by BANKER-RISHKIN; GRANDINETTI, 1997, p.141</ref> 

[[Robert Macfarlane (writer)|Robert Macfarlane]] in a review of the [[Jilly Cooper]] novel ''[[Pandora (2002 novel)|Pandora]]'' discussed how it has an increased ratio of sex per page than her earlier novels, such as ''[[Riders (novel)|Riders]],'' and that the sex is usually simple and happy, where "mutuality of orgasm is a given"''.''<ref name=":0">{{Cite news |last=MacFarlane |first=Robert |date=2002-05-05 |title=Laughing all the way to the bonk |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/may/05/fiction.features2 |access-date=2025-04-15 |work=The Observer |language=en-GB |issn=0029-7712}}</ref> He also pointed out that in ''Pandora'' there's a far greater range of sexual activities described than in other Cooper novels, that are not just [[Sexual intercourse|vaginal penetration]] by a penis.<ref name=":0" />