Foucault’s Virginity: Ancient Erotic Fiction and the History of Sexuality

The sexy, witty and often bizarre novels, poetry and dialogues of the first centuries of this era (works such as Longus’ Daphnis and Chloe, Achilles Tatius’ Leukippe and Cleitophon and Plutarch’s Amatorius) were being composed at the same time as fundamental ideas about the body, gender and sexuality were being set in place with the rise of Christianity and the Church to dominate the pagan world. Modern writers on the history of sexuality have largely ignored this literature in favour of prose treatises, philosophy and Christian homilies. Simon Goldhill, writing with the same wit and verve as the ancient writers with whom he engages, sets out to put these texts back into the history of sexuality. The result is a dazzling celebration of sex and sexuality in the Greek literature of the first centuries CE.

• A dazzling celebration of sex and sexuality in the Greek literature of the first centuries • Written with the same wit and verve as that of the ancient writers with whom he engages • Examines the often ignored sexy, ironic and bizarre texts of the ancient novels, erotic poetry and humorous dialogues

Preface; 1. Virginity and going the whole hog: violence and the protocols of desire; 2. The gay science; 3. How like a woman; Notes; Indexes.