Sex & Desire
‘I used to like talking about sex. All of life, I imagined – from politics to aesthetics – merged in passionate human conjunction. A caress, not to speak of a kiss, could transport you from longing to Russia, on to Velazquez and ahead to anarchism.’ (‘Blue, Blue Pictures of You’)
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‘I never lost my fearful fascination with women’s bodies. The women seemed to understand this: that the force of our desire made us crazy and terrified. You could kill a woman for wanting her too much.’ (‘The Body’)
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‘He was fumbling in his inside pocket when he found something strange.
He pulled it out.
“What’s that?” his wife said. She came closer. “It’s a penis,” she said. “You’ve come home with a man’s penis — complete with balls and pubic hair — in your pocket. Where did you get it?” (‘The Penis’)
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‘The following weeks she seems to sense something. In the space where they lie beneath the level of the street, almost underground — a mouse’s view of the world — she invites him to lie in different positions; she bids him touch different parts of her body. She shows him they can pore over one another.’ (‘Nightlight’)
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‘But in love each moment is magnified, and every gesture, word and syllable is examined like a speech by the President. Solid expectation, unfurled hope, immeasurable disappointment — all are hurled together like a cocktail of random drugs that, quaffed within the hour, make both lovers reel. If she dressed up and went to a party with a male friend, he spent the night catatonic with paranoia; if he saw an old girlfriend, she assumed they would never speak again.’ (‘Blue, Blue Pictures of You’)
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‘When it comes to love, we are all stalkers.’ (‘Goodbye, Mother’)
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All citations are taken from Collected Stories, Hanif Kureishi (Faber and Faber, 2010).