WILLIAM PHILLIPS
355
The usual approach to the problem has been to distinguish pornogra–
phy from literature and art. But what can we say to people, even to people
like Shattuck, who admit that de Sade's pornographic writing is art, and
how and by whom is the distinction to be made? I, for one, am ready to
say that much of de Sade is not art. Nor is Mapplethorpe art. The line
between them is sometimes very thin. Still, the fact is that a good deal of
Indian erotic drawing has to be conceded to be art.
Ultimately, we run up against a common belief that in a free society
everything that is not criminal or harmful to other people should be per–
nutted. Perhaps one solution, which I think Shattuck tends to accept, is
that everything should be pernutted but should not be easily available. Or
is this a form of hedging?
The problem of pornography has to do with morality in general. But
it is doubtful that morality can be legislated. Perhaps it can be advanced
only through the family, the conm1Unity, and religion.
w.p.
