The Bedtrick: Tales of Sex and Masquerade"Somehow I woke up one day and found myself in bed with a stranger." Meant literally or figuratively, this statement describes one of the best-known plots in world mythology and popular storytelling. In a tour that runs from Shakespeare to Hollywood and from Abraham Lincoln to Casanova, the erudite and irrepressible Wendy Doniger shows us the variety, danger, and allure of the "bedtrick," or what it means to wake up with a stranger. The Bedtrick brings together hundreds of stories from all over the world, from the earliest recorded Hindu and Hebrew texts to the latest item in the Weekly World News, to show the hilariously convoluted sexual scrapes that people manage to get themselves into and out of. Here you will find wives who accidentally commit adultery with their own husbands. You will read Lincoln's truly terrible poem about a bedtrick. You will learn that in Hong Kong the film The Crying Game was retitled Oh No! My Girlfriend Has a Penis. And that President Clinton was not the first man to be identified by an idiosyncratic organ. At the bottom of these wonderful stories, ancient myths, and historical anecdotes lie the dynamics of sex and gender, power and identity. Why can't people tell the difference in the dark? Can love always tell the difference between one lover and another? And what kind of truth does sex tell? Funny, sexy, and engaging, The Bedtrick is a masterful work of energetic storytelling and dazzling scholarship. Give it to your spouse and your lover. |
From inside the book
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Page vii
... 76 / The Abandoning Mother and Lover 87 Approach Two : Psychology 91 The Case of the Missing Identity 91 / Freudian Bedtricks 95 / Otto Rank on the Double 99 / Lacan on the Mirror Stage 101 THREE : Waking Up in Bed with an Animal 105 vii.
... 76 / The Abandoning Mother and Lover 87 Approach Two : Psychology 91 The Case of the Missing Identity 91 / Freudian Bedtricks 95 / Otto Rank on the Double 99 / Lacan on the Mirror Stage 101 THREE : Waking Up in Bed with an Animal 105 vii.
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Contents
Sex Text and Masquerade | 1 |
Telling the Difference 5 Sexual Lies and Sexual | 10 |
The Rape of the False Mother | 69 |
Waking Up in Bed with an Animal | 105 |
Snakes and Mermaids 114 The Fatal | 122 |
The LovelyLoathly Lady | 140 |
Old Women Masquerading as Young Women 151 | 151 |
The Cuckolds of the Heart | 205 |
CrossCultural CrossDressing | 335 |
Incest | 383 |
Entendre 404 A Lover by Any Other Name | 407 |
Just a Kiss 420 Penis Envy 424 The Womens Room 427 | 427 |
The Return of the Return of Martin Guerre 428 Sexual | 462 |
Splitting Hares 466 Minimal and Other Pairs 467 | 472 |
Carnal Ignorance 475 Carnal Knowledge 482 False | 487 |
Bedtricks in Stith Thompsons | 493 |
on His Collar | 228 |
man Blindness and Divine Invisibility | 234 |
Diritto della Signora 275 Hindu Subversions of the Droit | 282 |
Color Class and Clout | 292 |
Bibliography | 535 |
Double Features Bedtricks and Related | 567 |
577 | |
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Common terms and phrases
adultery Alcmena Amphitryon Angela Carter animal argues asks beautiful bedtrick bedtrickster body bride brother Casanova child Chunagon F/m cross-dressing cuckolding cultures dark daughter deception demon desire Doniger double double-back double-cross droit du seigneur eyes falls in love false fantasy father female film fooled Freud gender girl Hebrew Bible Hindu human husband Ibid identity Implied Spider incest Jalandhara Kami Kami M/f kill king kiss Lady Leah levirate Loathly Lady look lover magic Mahabharata male married Martin Guerre masquerade Midrash mirror mistress mother mythology myths Naishi no Kami night novel O'Flaherty partner Parvati person play pretends Purana Rachel Ramayana RAMBHA rape Ravana recognize Ruth Saisho Samjna Sanskrit says seduce sexual act Shiva sister sleep someone Sommersby story surrogate tale Tamar tell texts theme told Trans transsexual trick trickster truth twin ugly variant victim Vishnu wife woman women York young