Sade: 120 Days of Sodom

Sade wrote "The 120 Days of Sodom" in the space of thirty-seven days in 1784 while he was locked up in the Bastille. Being short of writing materials, he wrote it in tiny writing on a continuous, twelve-metre long roll of paper. When the Bastille was stormed and looted on July 14, 1789 during the height of the French Revolution, Sade believed the work was lost forever and later wrote that he "wept tears of blood" over its loss. However, the long roll of paper on which it was written was later found hidden in his cell, having escaped the attentions of the looters. The first publisher of the work, Dr. Bloch, regarded its thorough categorization of all manner of sexual fetishes as having "scientific importance...to doctors, jurists, and anthropologists." For sure, one of the most shocking and challenging books of all time.