An intresting introduction, only a memoir, not a study

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	• The Surrender : An Erotic Memoir Toni Bentley, 2004 - 224 pages average customer review:based on 41 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Sowing seed in a barren furrow: 3.5 stars

"Words seemed the only way to mark the spot, to preserve my transitory experience of eternity. This is a testamentary document. Do not miss the message, distracted by the profanity of the act." (8-9) The seven pages that comprise "The Holy F[&%$]" earn five stars. As a man, within this book-- not my usual genre!-- I found this introduction revelatory: it shows the male how otherworldly the act of sex can become when made unfamiliar and raw and sanctified by its daring. The disorienting act of sex by its transfer away from the usual to the upended challenges the natural order. The rapture Bentley craves shares its closeness to that open to procreation. The loss of ego, however, she chooses to release not by the social norm for union but that proclaiming a humanistic defiance of the ordinary.

A rebellious decision that places a woman as truly pro-choice, even against the familiar voices for sexual freedom which themselves tended to disdain this action, which found few advocates among the now-PC orthodoxy of earlier pioneers for sexual liberation. Post-feminists, or more open-minded women, may find, as might many men, a potential for renewal of sexual possibility in this outré practice. In this brief memoir, hints of this arousing power echo from the introduction outward. While the rest of the book fails for me to expand upon the insights of the seven pages of text introducing this daring subject, Bentley is to be commended for her courage. She brings her idea and ideal of fulfillment by sexual longing to a mass market, mature, audience rather than where this book may have languished, in some "adult" category that no public library or major bookstore would have stocked.

Bentley recounts her literary, spiritual, and physical quest to find God in this tender but risky act of total submission to another man. She is a smart, witty woman. Not a natural writer, it seems; the introduction remains the most cogent presentation of her subject. Her own sexual exploits along brazen lines, in fact, make up "color commentary" compared to her main psycho-sexual narrative. Her reports from numbered acts among the nearly three-hundred "surrenders" spice up her reflections, the post-coital thoughts that as the quote I opened this review with demonstrates, she commits to paper as well as memory.

The topic, judged to make most readers skittish if judged by the coy refusal of the dust jacket blurbs to explicitly state her "holy act" makes this book controversial. This ultimate frontier is crossed by Bentley. It's probably the last to be explored, in our era where rumors of "rainbow parties" among adolescents, Monica and cigars, and casual banter have made another formerly whispered, semi-taboo act, that of oral stimulation, practically mainstream in our society. Bondage gear co-opted by Hot Topic, French maid uniforms by Halloween-clad grown-ups, sex emporiums franchised, there's little remaining even for half-prudish, half-brave Americans to contemplate that presents a higher barrier to overcome on the journey to knowledge through sexual union. For women who have the opportunity to have it all whenever and with whomever, Bentley asks: "is that all there is?" No less than a contemplative monk or nun, Bentley treats the "Sex & the City" generation to her candor and her own solution.

This disparity between what as Seneca lamented-- not to mention the boastful Doobie Brothers' album title!-- "what were once vices are now habits" of conventional vaginal and now (if only the past forty years) oral intercourse against that of alternative penetration make up the thrust of her argument here. Straight intercourse, she proposes, for her is by its "nature" meant to be too easy, too deceptive for the one entering, and too familiar. She counters the (in)famous passage in Norman Mailer's "An American Dream" that angered Kate Millett in the opening pages of her "Sexual Politics" decades ago. What's lacking in popular literature is a cultural history of attitudes towards this act, whose feared name [when you articulate the municipal sin misattributed to the Cities of the Plain {see Mark D. Jordan's book) by medieval Christian canonists blaming the cityfolks not for inhospitality let alone gang rape but male penetration] drips with condemnation, the taint of fire and the smell of brimstone.

"A raid on the Devil and a trip on back to the Lord" as Mailer sums up the difference between the two entries, but Bentley insists that this is a male view, and few males, she charges, have surrendered as she has. This sub-topic, however, is but alluded to in the rest of the memoir. Her consideration would have benefited from placing her own experience within a context of other men and women who have sought ecstasy beyond pleasure or pain. Her introduction posits for this form of trust in one's partner, one's own liberation on the way towards the mystical union with the divine. These are daring suggestions, and refreshing ones. But, for most of the remainder, her own affairs with men and a woman here and there take precedence over implications of this larger subject. It still awaits sustained and serious attention by a major publisher and a skilled interpreter. {See my Amazon review of one brief attempt, "The Rear View," Jean-Luc Hennig.} This background needs to be foregrounded, the sides reversed, the exchange of the dominant model of intercourse with the one that few today can honestly, openly confront.

My title of this review is one of the few analogies she does not use! But, I chose it as it symbolizes the decision to engage in an intimate encounter that remains the most confrontational in its refusal to follow the easier course, the natural destination we all drive towards, the road more traveled. Admittedly, it's difficult as Bentley herself finds to avoid bottom-heavy metaphors or puns, and she falls into this trap at the risk of silliness, which on the other hand lightens the self-analytical tone of her memoir. She reminds us that sex however pursued should be more enjoyable and less fraught with tension.

The issues she has with her father are covered in chapters I found rather predictable, and the arc of the affair with her lover "Mr. A" follows a familiar curve. While I recognize her commendable desire to overcome her atheist background by her search for the transcendent, and her own italicized couplings play well off the more detailed rationales and journalistic treatments, the balance of the narrative remains unsettled. Perhaps unavoidably in a book of this nervous search, but more polishing of the remainder of the manuscript to match the grace of its opening pages would have resulted in a better crafted study. Sex and spirituality deserve wherever an adept joins them a respectful, profound meditation.

It's as if she wanted to write a memoir about "it" and a study of "it," but then settled abruptly to chart her affair and end with its quick aftermath. She skims therefore in her conclusion a far more valuable integration of her Buddhist meditation. Surely the Tantric and esoteric teachings linking sex and spirit deserved more elucidation?

The book halts nearly too abruptly. Short chapters (two hundred large-type pages can easily be read in less than two hours) dash about between well-chosen quotes, statistics, random musings, and an admittedly intriguing comparison between the rigors of her quarter-century of ballet training and the demands that she places her body and soul into while enjoying the embrace of her adventurous lover. Recommended for open-minded readers, and I hope this book will encourage writers to consider more complex implications of the subversive argument and enticing situations Bentley uncovers.

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A Guilty Pleasure, But Is It True?

I'm a little ashamed to admit that I sought this book out after reading in "Slate" that the author has said since publishing her memoir that she really invented much of the psychological healing which resulted from her journey through the joys of anal sex. But I did, and I did read this epic valentine to backdoor ecstasy.

I have never read any of Ms. Bentley's other works. She's a pretty good writer, although very self-involved. I guess years of studying herself in large mirrors while performing and rehearsing with the New York City Ballet company would be enough to make anyone take themselves a tad too seriously. She never really "made it" as a ballerina -- she was always just a member of the corps and never a star or even a featured dancer. But, as she points out several times in the book, to be in the chorus in NYC Ballet is the same as being top dog in any other troupe. These comments came off as sour grapes, and I think this book was probably a huge over-compensation when it was written, as well as a way to make a quick buck.

That being said, the book is very explicit, and though I wouldn't read it over again, I got through it in one sitting. It's kind of like watching a slow-motion car accident, and then overhearing the driver who caused the accident explaining to the cop afterwards how the accident wasn't her fault. You know that the accident is none of your business, and that the driver is full of it -- but you can't help but stick around until the whole mess is cleaned off the road.

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An intresting introduction, only a memoir, not a study

This is a good little read, basically Toni Bentley's first hand story about discovering the joys of anal sex. She doesn't go into much detail about many parts of it and so in many ways only really introduces the reader to the first stages of her total liberation, in many ways her anal sex experiences representing many of the same things to her as vaginal sex does for people on first entering the sexual arena. That is, the feeling of liberation on realizing the same bliss can be achieved with subsequent partners when the emotional baggage is cleared out etc.

In many ways, for readers who come to this book just out of a curiosity, I feel Toni could have offered a little more. Others do, Authors such as Tristan Taormino, Jan Sincero (in passing in `The Straight Girl's Guide to Sleeping with Chicks'), and many references and understandings provided by people such as, and especially, Suzie Bright (from the gay Womens' scene).

For the inexperienced reader, Toni only focuses on the intensity of the sensations surrounding anal penetration and doesn't mention some of the heightened sensations.

With the same sphincter responding but in a different area and with so many more nerve endings it was only through anal sex one of my partners ever got to knowing the `whole of body' type orgasm. Normally we would only go anal after a series of vaginal orgasms, by when most people would be ready to collapse exhausted and call it a night. It was pretty mind-blowing to be part of that experience for her, when she would lose all control and be overcome (no pun intended) like a seizure. Ms Bentley doesn't really give any detail of any similar experience, never really talking about her orgasms or their intensity when achieved anally, more's probably the pity, knowledge like that possibly being valuable for the inexperienced to overcome any fear or apprehension. However, this is her story, not a manual, her choice what, and how much detail she wishes to share.

These higher levels of intensity and climax are the start of the stages of anal stimulation and release that Toni doesn't detail, we can only assume she achieved and experienced. This `anal epiphany' (if that's not blasphemous) is looked at in much more detail in such things as Tristan Taormino's texts (The complete guide to Anal sex for women). Ms Taormino's books can be little challenging for we blokes because she sells the experience as one for both/all genders but are still beautiful reads because of the comfortable acceptance of all things and exclusive interest in quality of life and experience. After all there is no 'normal'.

The next stage of `anal mind-boggle' is the `blissed to almost pass out' stage. Known to Mystics and Spiritualists over history and demonized by the mainstream because of the sense of empowerment and access to the Goddess energy for the Womenexperiencing it whom the system wanted to suppress. This stage is touched on a little by some of Susie Bright's texts, not approached at all here by Ms Bentley.

It's not something for everyone, but it's also not something to fear if it feels right. Maybe the most powerful statement in the book is regarding the deceptions etc so many people's sexual lives represent is that `The ass-hole never lies' (in reference to being able to `fake it' with vaginal sex but never with anal abandon). Anal sex is not for everyone, you'll fail at finding `your thing' if you look in the wrong place, the same as you will by looking for the wrong thing. Toni's message tells us what it was for her and hopefully will help some people lose their fear of looking for theirs, wherever they may find it.

Cheers

Lloyd

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Hot reading

Even if anal sex isn't your thing, this is a hot book, because it's about a woman revealing all about her sexuality. I enjoyed it. I'm currently reading Abby Lee's Diary of a Sex Fiend: Girl with a One Track Mind. It's the same kind of thing--a woman describing all her sexual thoughts and activities.

the ballerina's booty : the inside story

norman mailer liked the writings of soren kierkegaard, but carrying the heavy weight of belief in his own talent and genius, made a poor follower; he just wasn't sufficiently submissive for the calling, a problem quite a few men have with the judeo-christian religion, if the ratio of women churchgoers to men churchgoers is acceptable as proof. to be truly submissive to a god the father principle requires followers for whom their own paternity is neither diminished nor held in question separate from one's identity. women.

there is the angry woman who doubts masculine authority, in which case the man in her life fares well by getting her, if not taking her, to church where she can learn that the man is the head of the woman, his authority god given instead of biologically given. otherwise, stay with her or leave her, she remains the kind of woman who needs a stiff one up the bum.

this is where toni bentley enters, or is entered. a tough willowy ballerina by training, years of tightening the opening of her backdoor, married, then divorced, celibate, then promiscuous, deliciously promiscuous: 33 men, from loss of virginity thru marriage and up until she meets the man who first penetrates her backdoor which begins her spiritual awakening, now that god has her attention, and she submits willingly, surrendering expectantly weekly, sometimes 3 and 4 times a week, past the pain to paradise.

and, for tori, there is pain. pain, for tori, is acceptable. bleeding is not acceptable, nor any traces of excrement. some women believe if there's pain in the act, then either the activity is not worth doing or the pain is an indicator that you're not doing it right. tori's take is that the entrance, or, before her first time, exit, of her tush is tightly wound, as in winding not as in injury, from 25 years at the ballet barre and her new activity was a divine unwinding.

the surrender, with its many sexually graphic passages, is subtitled, an erotic memoir. especially the selections from the chronicled 298 episodes she shares.

is this inspirational reading for other young women? i don't know. i suspect men interested in pursuing this activity with women thank her and hold up this one woman's surrendering as example and affirmation of a good thing.

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reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

This NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK is a stunning story of sexual and spiritual awakening.

Few women do it and even fewer will admit to it. But in Toni Bentley's daring and intimate memoir, THE SURRENDER, she pulls the sheets back on an erotic experience that's been forbidden since the Bible and celebrates "the joy that lies on the other side of convention, where risk is real and rapture resides." From STORY OF O to THE KISS TO THE SEXUAL LIFE OF CATHERIN M, readers have been enthralled with sexually subversive memoirs by women. But even those erotic classics didn't navigate the psychosexual terrain that Bentley does when she meets a lover who introduces her to a radical and unexpected pleasure, to the "holy" act that she came to see as her awakening.

THE SURRENDER is a witty, intelligent, and eloquent exploration of one woman's obsession that will be sure to leave readers questioning their own desires.

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