Literary Seductions : Compulsive Writers and Diverted Readers

‘The reader’s love of the writing tends to become indistinguishable from his love of the writer.’

Beautiful writing has exercised its intoxicating power over readers since time immemorial. And yet, on occasion, this seduction extends beyond the page and sparks an irreversible connection between author and reader. This is a true literary seduction.

In Literary Seductions, Frances Wilson demonstrates how some of history’s most renowned writers were themselves ensnared by the writing they consumed, and which in turn consumed them. Through a series of famous literary couples – Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning; Anaïs Nin and Henry Miller; Osip Mandelstam and his wife Nadezhda – Wilson evokes the evolution from literary seduction to sexual desire.

With stories of self-sacrifice, self-effacement and even self-immolation, Literary Seductions recounts the powerful, inflammatory and sometimes destructive nature of literature.