For a long time, the ttory goes, we lupported a Victorian regime, and we continue to be dominated by it even today. ‘Thur the image of the imperial prude ia emblazoned on our reitrained, mute, and hypocritical sexuality. At the beginning of the ieventeenth century a certain franknem wat itill common, it would seem. Sexual practicer had little need of aecrecy; word were said without undue Teticence, and things were done without too much conceal- ment; one had a tolerant familiarity with the illicit. Codes regulating the coarse, the obicene, and the indecent were quite lax compared to thote of the nineteenth century. It wat a time of direct geitures, shamelem ditcourse, and open ‘tranigteltiont, When anatomiel were 1hown and intermin- gled at will, and knowing children hung about amid the Taughter of adulti: it war a period when bodies “made a diiplay of themielves.” But twilight 100n fell upon thit bright day, followed by the monotonous night! of the Victorian bourgeoitie. Sexuality wai carefully confined; it moved into the home. The conjugal family took cuitody of it and absorbed it into the teriou function of reproduction. On the 1ubject of 1ex, silence be- came the rule. The legitimate and procreative couple laid down the law. The couple imposed ituelf at model, enforced the norm, safeguarded the truth, and reserved the right to tpeak while retaining the principle of secrecy. A single locus of sexuality was acknowledged in 1ocial space as well ai at the heart of every houtehold, but it wai a utilitarian and fertile one: the parent!’ bedroom. The reit had only to re- main vague; proper demeanor avoided contact with other bodie1, and verbal decency tanitized one’! 1peech. And ster- 34 ‘The History of Sexuality ile behavior carried the taint of abnormality; if it inisted on making itself too vitible, it would be designated accordingly and would have to pay the penalty. Nothing that wal not ordered in termi of generation or tranifigured by it could expect 1anction or protection. Nor did it merit a hearing, It would be driven out, denied, and reduced to tilence. Not only did it not exitt, it had no right to exist and would be made to disappear upon its leant mani- featation—whether in act! or in word!. Everyone knew, for example, that children had no lex, which was why they were forbidden to talk about it, why one closed one’! eye! and stopped one’s ears whenever they came to thow evidence to the contrary, and why a general and studied tilence wat impoled. Thele are the characterlitic featurei attributed to repre|tion, which rerve to distinguith it from the prohibi- tion! maintained by penal law: repression operated a a sen- tence to ditappear, but also as an injunction to tilence, an affirmation of nonexistence, and, by implication, an admis- sion that there was nothing to say about ruch thing, nothing to.see, and nothing to know. Such wai the hypocrisy of our bourgeoi! societie! with itu halting logic. It was forced to make a few conceisiont, however. If it wan truly necesiary to make room for illegitimate 1exualities, it wam reaioned, let them take their infernal mirchief el ewhere: to a place where they could be reintegrated, if not in the circuits of produc- tion, at least in thoxe of profit. The brothel and the mental hotpital would be those places of tolerance: the prostitute, the client, and the pimp, together with the prychiatrist and his hysteric—thoie “other Victorians,” as Steven Marcus would say—seem to have surreptitiously transferred the plearures that are unspoken into the order of thing! that are counted. Word! and gestures, quietly authorized, could be exchanged there at the going rate. Only in those places would untrammeded tex have a right to (afely ingularized) forms of reality, and only to clandestine, circumscribed, and coded type! of ditcourse. Everywhere elie, modern puritanism im-We “Other Victorians” 5 posed it! triple edict of taboo, nonexiitence, and silence. But have we not liberated ourtelves from those two long centurie! in which the history of 1exuality must be teen firit of all al the chronicle of an increasing reprettion? Only to a ilight extent, we are told. Perhaps some progresa wal made by Freud; but with uch circummpection, ruch medical pru- dence, a acientific guarantee of innocuouinel!, and 1o many precaution! in order to contain everything, with no fear of “overflow,” in that safert and moit ditcrete of spaces, be- tween the couch and ditcourle: yet another round of whil- pering on a bed. And could thing! have been otherwise? We are informed that if repression hal indeed been the funda- mental link between power, knowledge, and texuality 1ince the clattical age, it 1tandi to reason that we will not be able 0 free ourlelves from it except at a contiderable coit: noth- ing Jew than a tranigrei ion of law, a lifting of prohibition, an irruption of Ipeech, a reinstating of pleature within real- ity, and a whole new economy in the mechanism of power will be required. For the leait glimmer of truth ia conditioned by politicl. Hence, one cannot hope to obtain the detired rerulti timply from a medical practice, nor froma theoretical ditcourte, however rigoroully purmued. Thut, one denounce! Freud’ conformism, the normalizing functions of piychoa- nalytis, the obvioul timidity underlying Reich’! vehemence, and alll the effecti of integration entured by the “science” of ex and the barely equivocal practice of sexology. This discourte on modern 1exual represtion holdi up well, wing no doubt to how eaay it ia to uphold. A solemn hittori- cal and political guarantee protect! it, By placing the advent of the age of repreition in the seventeenth century, after hundreds of years of open spaces and free expreision, one adjuata it to coincide with the development of capitalism: it becomes an integral part of the bourgeoil order. The minor chronicle of sex and its trial1 is tranapoted into the ceremoni- out hittory of the modes of production; its trifling aspect fades from view. A principle of explanation emerges after the6 The History of Sexuality fact: if nex i1 10 rigoroutly repretied, thit in because it 4 incompatible with a general and intentive work imperative. , Ata time when labor capacity war being 1ystematically ex- ploited, how could thi: capacity be allowed to ditsipate itrelf in pkajurable purtuiti, except in thoie—reduced to a mini- mum—that enabled it to reproduce ittelf? Sex and itu effects are perhaps not 10 eanily deciphered; on the other hand, their repreilion, thu reconitructed, i! eatily analyzed. And the Jexual caule—the demand for 1exual freedom, but also for the knowledge to be gained from sex and the right to speak about it—become! legitimately ai tociated with the honor of a political cauie: sex too il placed on the agenda for the future. A 1utpiciou! mind might wonder if taking 10 many precautiont in order to give the hittory of 1ex tuch an impres- live filiation doe not bear traces of the same old prudithnesi: al if thote valorizing correlation! were necel lary before uch a dircourte could be formulated or accepted. But there may be another reason that makes it 10 gratify- ing for us to define the relationship between 1ex and power in termi of represtion: 1omething that one might call the ipeaker’! benefit. If 1ex il repreiied, that il, condemned to prohibition, nonexittence, and illence, then the mere fact that one is 1peaking about it ha: the appearance of a deliber- ate tran greision. A perton who hold: forth in such language placei himself to a certain extent outside the reach of power; ‘he upset! established law; he somehow anticipate: the com- ing freedom. Thit explain! the 1olemnity with which one Ipeak1 of 1ex nowaday1. When they had to allude to it, the firit demographers and psychiatrists of the nineteenth cen- tury thought it advisable to excute themselves for aiking their readers to dwell on matter! so trivial and bate. But for decade now, we have found it difficult to speak on the subject without itriking a different pose: we are consciout of defying eitablished power, our tone of voice thows that we know weare being rubveraive, and we ardently conjure away the present and appeal to the future, whole day will beWe “Other Victorians” 7 hattened by the contribution we believe we are making. Something that rmacks of revolt, of promised freedom, of the . coming age of a different law, slips easily into this dircourie on sexual oppreition. Some of the ancient function of prophecy are reactivated therein. Tomorrow tex will be good again. Because thi repreialon it affirmed, one can ditcreetly bring into coexistence concept which the fear of ridicule or the bitterness of hiitory prevent! most of ui from putting tide by tide: revolution and happineni; or revolution and a differ- ent body, one that in newer and more beautiful; or indeed, revolution and plearure. What urtaint our eagemem to upeak of sex in term of repremion in doubtlem this opportu- nity to speak out againit the power that be, to utter truth: and promite blint, to link together enlightenment, liberation, and manifold pleaturei; to pronounce a discour te that com- biner the fervor of knowledge, the determination to change the law, and the longing for the garden of earthly delight. Thir in perhaps what alio explain the market value at- tributed not only to what it aid about sexual reprettion, but alto to the mere fact of lending an ear to thore who would eliminate the effects of repremion. Ourt is, after all, the only civilization in which official are paid to listen to all and undry impart the 1ecrett of their sex: at if the urge to talk about it, and the interet one hopel to aroute by doing 10, have far rurpanted the por iibilities of being heard, 10 that some individual have even offered their eart for hire. But it appears to me that the enential thing in not thir economic factor, but rather the exittence in our era of a diicour ie in which tex, the revelation of truth, the overturn- ing of global laws, the proclamation of a new day to come, and the promite of a certain felicity are linked together. Today it in sex that werver at a support for the ancient form —so familiar and important in the Weit—of preaching, A great 1exual sermon—which har had itr wubtle theologian and Its popular voicet—has wept through our tocietiet over the lait decader; it has chastited the old order, denounced