goosemixtapes 's review for:

The Nun by Denis Diderot

4.0

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3 stars for the first half, 4 stars for the sudden turn into softcore 1796-appropriate lesbian nun erotica*. rounding up from 3.5 for the batshit circumstances of how it was written**. on a meta level, the association of convents with seduction (in the sense that young girls are seduced into convents when they don’t know better and then trapped/ruined for the outside world) is fascinating social commentary. on a character level, i’m sending sister susan the lesbian masterdoc
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*some quotes, because it's hard to overstate the degree to which i was reading this thinking "am i going insane? am i reading too deep? did he know what he was doing. he had to know what he was doing. am i LOSING it or-" (all from the francis birrel translation. nsfw warning?)

"Meanwhile she had raised her neckerchief and placed one of my hands on her breast. She was silent and so was I. She appeared to experience the greatest rapture. She asked me to kiss her forehead, her cheeks, her eyes, and her lips. I obeyed her. I do not think there can have been any harm in that. Meanwhile her pleasure increased, and as I asked nothing better than to add to her pleasure in any innocent way, I kissed her again on her forehead, her cheeks, her eyes, and her lips... She exhorted me stammering and in a low and strange voice to redouble my caresses, and I did so. Then came a moment, I do not know if it was pleasure or pain, when she turned pale as death: her eyes closed, all her body stiffened violently, her lips first were tightened and then wet as if with a light froth; then her mouth opened slightly and she seemed to me to die, as she uttered a deep sigh. I got up quickly: I thought she was ill. I wished to go out and call for help. She opened her eyes fully and said in a dying voice: 'My innocent, it is nothing. What are you going to do? It is nothing.' I looked at her with puzzled eyes, uncertain if I should go or stay. She opened her eyes once more. She could no longer say anything. She signaled to me to approach and put me on to her knees again. I do not understand what went on inside me. I was afraid, I trembled, my heart thumped, I had difficulty in breathing, I felt disturbed, oppressed, agitated; I was frightened. I felt that my strength was abandoning me and that I was going to swoon. But I cannot say that the experience was exactly painful."

^ the moment i went from "this is a little homo" to "is this about to be porn."

"She took my arms and kissed them. 'Fancy drowning these eyes in tears,' and she kissed them, 'or calling forth from these lips complaints and groans,' and she kissed my lips, 'or condemning this charming and serene countenance to continual clouds of sorrow,' and she kissed my face, 'or withering the roses on these cheeks,' and she stroked them with her hand and kissed them, 'or destroying the beauty of that head, tearing that hair out, and lining that brow with care,' and she kissed my head, my brow, and my hair. 'Fancy daring to put a rope round that neck and tear those shoulders with pointed nails!' She pushed aside the covering of my neck and head and opened the top of my dress. My hair fell scattered on my bare shoulders: my breast was half-exposed, and she covered with kisses my neck, bare shoulders, and half-naked breast. [...] I do not know what was happening inside me, but I was seized with a terror, a trembling, and a desire to swoon which verified my suspicion that her illness was contagious."

^ contagious... susan i have something to tell you but you're not gonna like it

"She paused here, and properly so, for what she was going to ask me was not right. And perhaps I am still more wrong to repeat it. But I have made up my mind to hide nothing.

'You have never been tempted to observe with satisfaction how handsome you are?'

'No, Mother; I am not sure I am as handsome as you say. And even if I were, one is handsome for others, not for oneself.'

'You have never thought of running your hands over your lovely breast, over your body, your flesh, which is so firm, so soft, and so white.'"

^ need to clarify that "mother" is the convent's mother superior. not literally her mother. anyway #justnunthings: "hey susan do you ever feel tempted to jerk off to your own beautiful body"

"'One only goes to confession to accuse oneself of one's sins; and I see none in my tender love for such a lovable girl as Saint Susan.'"

^ do susan and the mother superior have a "good" relationship. no. because it is hard for susan to say no to the woman who leads the convent. however. this line did get me in the heart

"By day, if I was walking or in the work- or recreation-room and placed in such a manner that I could not see her, she passed whole hours gazing at me."

^ let me mention that the mother superior is one of TWO nuns who

Spoiler

LITERALLY DIES BECAUSE OF HER FEELINGS FOR/IN SYMPATHY TOWARD SUSAN

"Follow his advice [to avoid the Mother Superior] and try to be ignorant of the reasons for it [lesbianism] as long as you live."

"But it seems to me that if I knew the danger I should be the more attentive to avoid it."

"The opposite might perhaps be the case."

^ they don't tell her about lesbianism because they're afraid she'll enjoy it too much. the convent is SO afraid of this woman getting her pussy ate

"But can the caresses and familiarities of one woman be dangerous to another?"

There was no answer from Dom Morel.

"Am I not the same as when I arrived here?"

There was no answer from Dom Morel.

"Should I not have continued to be the same? Where, then, is the harm of loving, of saying so, and testifying to it? It is so sweet."

^ susan i'm getting you out of that nunnery and we're going to pride.

"Alone in bed, [the Mother Superior] sees me, talks to me, asks me to come and stand beside her, addresses me the tenderest remarks. If she hears steps round her room she cries: 'It is she who is going by. I recognize her step. Let her be called in... No, no, let her be.'

The curious thing is that she never made a mistake, taking another for me."

^ that last line? girl the way i felt realizing i was deeply deeply invested in the eighteenth-century lesbian nun class reading

and finally:

"'Her eyes, her lips. When shall I see her again? Sister Agatha, tell her I love her. Describe my condition to her. Tell her I am dying...'"

^ this is right before

Spoiler

THE SUPERIOR DIES BECAUSE OF INTERNALIZED HOMOPHOBIA / BEING SEPARATED FROM SUSAN

. DUDE.

halfway through this book the other nuns accused susan of doing Untoward Things with another girl and i wrote in my status update "on god sister susan we're gonna get you some gay sex." little did i Fucking Know. no it isn't GOOD gay rep; it falls into the predatory older lesbian stereotype; but oh my fucking god i was not expecting it and the emotional journey i went through.
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**you thought that was wild for 1796? guess what. there's more. this book is fucking nuts. it's a fictionalized memoir, but it's based off the story of a real nun who appealed in court to be released from her convent (an appeal which failed). diderot had a friend who got really into the case. and so, a few years down the line when that friend moved away and his old buddies missed him, said buddies decided the only thing to do, naturally, was START WRITING HIM LETTERS PRETENDING TO BE THE REAL NUN ASKING HIM TO COME BACK HOME TO HELP HER BEFORE SHE KILLS HERSELF. and it got so intense that to avoid getting caught (because of course they could not actually produce a nun at the end of this shtick), THEY KILLED HER OFF. like. the last letter was someone being like "ya she died lol sorry." eventually they did have to confess it was a prank, but not before diderot got so deep into it that he brought himself to tears writing the fake nun's 200-page fake memoir. from the bottom of my heart all i've got is "girl what the fuck." this book is nuts