Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Story of the Eye
Book Review: Nauseating In The Extreme--I'm Still Traumatized After 7 Yrs
Summary: 1 Stars
If you're looking for something appalling for sheer shock value, this is the book for you. It's been 7 yrs since I've read this story and I still get the creeps just thinking about it. This story is a non-stop depiction of murder as an erotic agent.Book Review: Nope, haven't read it yet.
Summary: 4 Stars
Hiya folks, this is Susan the Puddle Jumper. Story of the Eye sounds like a very good book, and I'm tempted to get myself a copy. But I'd rather wait until Björk buys me a copy herself. Have a good one.Book Review: Not for Kids!
Summary: 5 Stars
I found this book looking through my wife's "recently viewed" list and thought it would be an excellent gift for our 12 year old niece who loves R.L. Stein's "Goosebumps" and "Fear Street" series. Boy, was I wrong! I thought the spooky cover, title, and foreign name of the author indicated a classic horror novel in the vein of Frankenstein or Dracula. I naturally assumed that my wife had found a book for our niece and I would handle the financial end. Unfortunately I found out I had misjudged the book a few weeks later when my sister-in-law called in hysterics, accusing me of sending their daughter pornography! I told her I did no such thing and suggested maybe there was a mix up in shipping as I had sent her a book and not a movie. She told me that they had indeed received the book and was certain it was porn as they owned the book. I apologized profusely and asked my wife about the book. She explained that her sister had recommended it as an inspirational tool for the bedroom. we eventually got around to reading the book and found that these kids are quite imaginative, insane maybe, but very imaginative! Five Stars.Book Review: Odd little gem of perversion and eros.
Summary: 4 Stars
Georges Bataille often falls between the cracks of literary identificaton because his work straddles so many uncomfortable realms. A sometime-Surrealist who had a falling out with Andre Breton, Bataille's books are often compared to the Marquis de Sade's. Reading "Story of the Eye" it's not hard to see why: two teenage lovers experiment with their bodies and with foreign objects; eventually their erotic adventures include madness, torture, murder and the death of a bullfighter.This is strange, heady stuff--fortunately the book is barely 100 pages long. This is underground literature at its finest, mocking the pretensions of culture, of decency, morality, and healthy sexuality. Bataille's style can be obtuse but can also illuminate dark, forbidden corners of humanity. If you're into de Sade, Wm. Burroughs, Surrealism, Clive Barker, the psychology of fetishism, or just want something to read that is light years from the crappy bestseller lists, read "The Story of the Eye" and introduce yourself to the unholy world of Georges Bataille.
Book Review: On some levels it works
Summary: 2 Stars
Actually I would probably give it 2 1/2 stars but since it wasn't an option I rounded down. I can't deny that this is an interesting book on a few levels, the problem is that the interesting elements just don't make the story as a whole that interesting.Let me start with the "ick" factor. Yes there is one but i've read much worse so I could easily stomach this without a flinch. There's nothing that's horrifically violent, just really a few scenes. Mostly the ick comes from urination. And let me tell you, there's a lot of it! I don't think two pages go by where someone isn't urinating on themselves or another person. I don't really mind a few fetishes here or there in a book but this book takes it to the point where urinating becomes the most boring thing in the entire story.
The second thing I want to mention is the plot. Yeah there really isn't one. The truth is that it doesn't really even start going anywhere until close to half-way through the book. The first half of the book is really just two teenagers "getting off" by urinating and playing with boiled eggs (no i'm not kidding). The second half you finally start going somewhere but by this time it's too late to actually get you to really care about the story or the characters. If it is one thing I wish this book would have given me is character development. We're given no reason or hints for why these two kids act the way the do or what motivates them. I would have liked just maybe a little psychology to help understand. But then maybe that would have taken away everything and if we really knew them then perhaps we would have been disgusted by them instead of just not caring.
Ok so i've only talked about the bad points. I'll speak about the good points. The best thing this book has going for itself is the length, it's very short so you can easily finish it in one sitting. I'll give props to the author for not dragging on (with exception of the urination on every page almost) and getting to the point. The second thing it has going for itself is how weird it is. I don't believe many people can read this book and think "This really reminds me of..." because there really isn't anything else like it. And finally the third thing is that it does manage to have some humor in it. There is a particular scene with a priest that can make you chuckle for a second.
I don't know whether I would say it wasn't worth the read. I do think perhaps it was but it just wasn't worth the buy. I can't ever see myself picking it up again and I wasn't very satisified by the short story that I thought I got my money's worth. I do think that Georges Bataille wanted to express some deep psychological meaning behind all of this but for the life of me I couldn't find it anywhere. If you can find some other way to read it without having to buy it then you should give it a try but otherwise I think you should save your money.