Until Fanny Hill, previous heroines had conducted their amorous liaisons “off-stage.” Any erotic misadventures were described euphemistically. As women who had gone astray, they always repented, which made even their most outrageous dalliances somehow suitable for a moralistic readership. The protagonist of Fanny Hill, however, never repented a single moment of her sexual exploits … quite the contrary! And with Fanny, the devil is in the details, realistically described. (Summary by Denny Mike) As he stood on one side for a minute or so, unbuttoning his waste-coat, and breeches, her fat, brawny thighs hung down, and the whole greasy landskip lay fairly open to my view: a wide open-mouth'd gap, overshaded with a grizzly bush, seemed held out like a beggar's wallet for its' provision. Mr. H ——— continu'd kind and tender to me, yet, with all this I was far from happy; for, besides my regrets for my dear youth, which though often suspended, or diverted, still return'd upon me in certain melancholic moments with redoubl'd violence, I wanted more society, more dissipation. In the mean time, the extension of my limbs, languid stretchings, sighs, short heavings, all conspired to assure that ​experienced wanton that I was more pleased than offended at her proceedings, which she seasoned with repeated kisses and exclamations, such as "Oh! what a charming creature thou art! —— what a happy man will he be that first makes a woman of you! ———— Oh! that I were a man for your sake ————!" with the like broken expressions, interrupted by kisses as fierce and falacious as ever I received from the other sex. Easily then reading in my eyes the full permission of myself to all his wishes, he scarce pleas'd himself more than me, when having insinuated his hand under my petticoat and shift, he presently remov'd those bars to the sight, by slily lifting them upwards, under favour of a thousand kisses, which he thought, perhaps, necessary to divert my attention to what he was about. All my drapery being now roll'd up to my waist, I threw myself into such a posture upon the couch, as gave up to him, in full view, the whole region of delight, and all the luxurious landscape round it. The transported youth devour'd every thing with his eyes, and try'd with his fingers to lay more open to his sight the secrets of that dark and delicious deep: he opens the folding lips, the softness of which yielding entry to any thing of a hard body, close round it, and oppose the sight: and feeling further, meets with, and wonders at, a soft ​fleshy excrescence, which, limber and relax'd after the late enjoyment, now grew, under the touch and examination of his fiery fingers, more and more stiff and considerable, till the titillating ardours of that so sensible part, made me sigh, as if he had hurt me. On which he withdrew his curious probing fingers, asking me pardon, as it were, in a kiss that rather increas'd the flame there.

Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure by John Cleland Fanny Hill or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure by John Cleland

Accordingly they were let in upon me, and all that frolic and thoughtless gaiety in which those giddy creatures ​consume their leisure, made me envy a condition of which I only saw the fair side: insomuch, that the being one of them became even my ambition: a disposition which they all carefully cultivated; and I wanted now nothing but to restore my health, that I might be able to undergo the ceremony of the initiation. I was soon pretty well recover'd, and at certain hours allow'd to range all over the house, but cautiously kept from seeing any company, till the arrival of Lord B ——— from Bath, to whom Mrs. Brown, ​in respect to his experienced generosity on such occasions, proposed to offer the perusal of that trinket of mine, which bears so great an imaginary value; and his lordship being expected in town in less than a fortnight, Mrs. Brown judged I would be entirely renewed in beauty, and freshness, by that time, and afford her the chance of a better bargain than she had driven with Mr. Crofts. Phœbe, who had more experience, and to whom such sights were not so new, could not however be unmov'd at so warm a scene; and drawing me away softly from the peep-hole, for fear of ​being over-heard, guided me as near the door as possible; all passive and obedient to her least signals. I would recommend this book to open minded people who want to study and see how historically the literature has changed. And I would imagine people interested in sex and how sexual life “of a Woman of Pleasure” has been described. Presently, assuming more courage, and seeking some diversion from my uneasy thoughts, I ventured to lift up my head a little, and sent my eyes on a course round the room, wherein they met full tilt with those of a lady (for such my extreme innocence pronounc'd her) sitting in a corner of the room, dress'd in a velvet mantle ( nota bene, in the midst of summer), with her bonnet off; squob-fat, red-faced, and at least fifty.Novelty ever makes the strongest impressions, and in pleasures especially: no wonder then, that he was swallow'd up in raptures of admiration of things so interesting by their nature, and now seen and handled for the first time. On my part, I was richly overpaid for the pleasure I gave him, in that of examining the power of those objects thus abandon'd to him, naked, and free to his loosest wish, over the artless, natural stripling: his eyes streaming fire, his cheeks glowing with a florid red, his fervid frequent sighs, whilst his hands convulsively squeez'd, opened, press'd together again the lips and sides of that deep flesh-wound, or gently twitch'd the over-growing moss; and all proclaim'd the excess, the riot of joys, in having his wantonness thus humour'd. ​But he did not long abuse my patience, for the objects before him had now put him by all his, and coming out with that formidable machine of his, he lets the fury loose, and pointing it directly to the pouting-lipt mouth, that bid him sweet defiance in dumb-shew, squeezes in the head, and driving with refresh'd rage, breaks in, and plugs up the whole passage of that soft-pleasure-conduit, where he makes all shake again, and put once more all within me into such an uproar, as nothing could still, but a fresh inundation from the very engine of those flames, as well as from all the springs with which nature floats that recevoir of joy, when risen to its flood-mark. He staid with me that evening, and we had a supper from a neighbouring tavern, after which, and a gay glass or two, the maid put me to bed, Mr. H ——— soon follow'd, and notwithstanding the fatigues of the preceding night, I found ​no quarter nor remission from him: He piqu'd himself, as he told me, on doing the honours of my new apartment. According to literary critic Thomas Holmes, Fanny and Mrs Cole see the homosexual act thusly: "the act subverts not only the hierarchy of the male over the female, but also what they consider nature's law regarding the role of intercourse and procreation". [25] Themes and genre [ edit ] Metonymy Phœbe could not hear it to the end without more than one interruption by peals of laughter, and my ingenuous way of relating matters did not a little heighten the joke to her. Giddy and intoxicated as I was with such satiating draughts of pleasure, I still lay on the couch, supinely stretch'd out, in a delicious languor diffus'd over all my limbs, hugging myself for being thus reveng'd to my heart's content, and that in a manner so precisely alike, and on the identical spot, in which I had receiv'd the suppos'd injury: no reflections on the consequences ever once perplex'd me, nor did I make myself one single reproach for having, by this step, completely enter'd myself of a profession more decry'd than disus'd. I should have held it ingratitude to the pleasure I had receiv'd, to have repented of it; and ​since I was now over the bar, I thought by plunging over head and ears into the stream I was hurried away by, to drown all sense of shame or reflection.

Fanny Hill - Wikipedia

At table, the conversation was chiefly kept up by the two madams, and carried on in double-meaning expressions, interrupted every now and then by kind assurance to me, all tending to confirm and fix my satisfaction with my present condition: augment it they could not, so very a novice was I then.

John Cleland

I had it now, I felt it now: and beginning to drive, he soon gave nature such a powerful summons down to her favourite quarters, that she could no longer refuse repairing thither: all my animal spirits then rush'd mechanically to that center of attraction, and presently, inly warm'd, and stirr'd as I was beyond bearing, I lost all restraint, and yielding to the force of the emotion, gave down, as mere woman, those effusions of pleasure, which in the strictness of still faithful love, I could have wish'd to have held up.