MELINDA CAMBER PORTER
77
a repression of sexuality. On the other hand, in the nineteenth
century we have in poetry a liberation from the Puritanical mind,
and an interest in sexuality . And that I see as a positive step . Now
the problem is that I find there are three levels in this domain of
eroticism. One is the animal, the biological. You find sex in plants,
in fact, everywhere.
It
is the domain of life and stands for the
preservation of life. Then you have the domain of eroticism. And
you find eroticism in primitive tribes. Eroticism is specifically
human . And it is different because primarily it is sexuality trans–
formed. People make love but they make love with imagination
and with ceremony, and in different styles. And then we have
another level.
It
is a very curious invention: the idea that "I love
you." Perhaps this concept of "love" began in Greece with homo–
sexual love and Platonic love. The Greeks would say they "loved"
a young boy. But it was as a way to contemplate absolute beauty.
That was not really love in the modern sense, in the real sense.
Love is possible when you are fixed on one person and this person
responds to you . This is the mystery . You do not just contemplate
the love object. For she is a person who can answer you, love you,
destroy you, who can do evil to you, etcetera. She is no longer at a
distance, as in Platonic life . You are intimate with her. And that
was a discovery of the poets, not of the philosophers. The poets
discovered it and then the novelists. This love is vast. And it is im–
portant to see the freedom of the love object, which is not an ob–
ject. And we worry, because we don't know if she or he is going to
answer us in the right way. This idea oflove is with a very unique
person, with a unique body. In eroticism you can replace the ob–
ject, and you can change. You can have one thousand people
making love at the same time in different positions . That's erot–
icism. But love is a kind of monstrosity, no?
It
is possible only
with that one person . I think that we owe to this passion the best
things of our civilization. The great novels, the great poetry, the
great myths . In some ways love was seen as a kind of sickness, but
a sickness without which you cannot live a real, good life.
MCP:
Yes , but you're saying that it's basically an invention of
poetry.
OP:
Yes. I am.
MCP:
And an invention that is invented by each nation.
OP:
Yes.
MCP:
It seems to me that the United States is particularly lacking in
any tradition of eroticism . Eroticism is to be found in France, and
