Seduction... was both a science and art - a blend of skill, discipline, proximity, and opportunity. Mostly proximity.

The love of violence is an aspect of our humanity. Even the weak wish to be strong primarily so they can wield the whip.

Love is nothing but lust misspelled.

As for the depiction of the Catholic church, it's not meant to be a prediction

Barbarians, we call them, while all the while we timidly cling to our Web like Visigoths crouching in the ruins of Rome's faded glory and proclaim ourselves civilized.

Merely to live without a pain Is little gladness, little gain, Ah, welcome joy tho' mixt with grief-- The thorn-set flower that crowns the leaf.

Prison always has been a good place for writers, killing, as it does, the twin demons of mobility and diversion