Woman ... is the divine object, violated, endlessly sacrificed yet always reborn, whose only joy, achieved through a subtle interplay of images, lies in contemplation of herself.

The voluntary captive The speechless the prisoner Which I hide in my very depths.

O felt that her mouth was beautiful, since her lover condescended to thrust himself into it . . .

I wrote 'The story of O' alone, for Dominique Aury, to interest him, to please him, to occupy him. I wasn't young, nor particularly pretty. I needed something which might interest a man like him.

Keep me rather in this cage, and feed me sparingly, if you dare. Anything that brings me closer to illness and the edge of death makes me more faithful. It is only when you make me suffer that I feel safe and secure. You should never have agreed to be a god for me if you were afraid to assume the duties of a god, and we know that they are not as tender as all that. You have already seen me cry. Now you must learn to relish my tears.

Story of O is a fairy tale for another world, a world where some part of me lived for a long time, a world that no longer exists except between the covers of a book.

I think that submissiveness can [be] and is a formidable weapon, which women will use as long as it isn't taken from them.