[informative
sadomasochism
and fetishism]




The following excerpts were taken from chapter five ["Strategic Pain:
Fetishism and Sadomasochism in CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS"]
of Butterman's thesis [1], focusing on: (a) "Mattoso's Poetic Voice as a
Paradoxical Persona;" and (b) "Sadism, Masochism, and Fetishism:
Connections and Disconnections."


(a) MATTOSO'S POETIC VOICE AS A PARADOXICAL PERSONA

A popular joke tells us of the meeting between a sadist and a masochist;
the masochist says: 'Hurt me.' The sadist replies: 'No.' This is a
particularly stupid joke, not only because it is unrealistic but because
it foolishly claims competence to pass judgment on the world of
perversions. It is unrealistic because a genuine sadist could never
tolerate a masochistic victim [...] Neither would the masochist tolerate
a truly sadistic torturer. (Gilles Deleuze, MASOCHISM: COLDNESS AND
CRUELTY, 40-1).

Deleuze spends many pages tirelessly attempting to dispel the
generalization that sadomasochism is a singular entity, a "perversion,"
as he calls it, where each partner performs specific roles to induce or
invite pain from her counterpart in a contractual arrangement. With
concrete characterizations of profiles of masochists and sadists based
on both their literary configurations in Sade and Masoch and Freudian
psychoanalytic theory, Deleuze calls for the disentanglement of these
two sexual identities. In particular, he emphasizes their differences
but also admits similarities without making simplistic claims to their
interdependency, as literary critics as well as psychoanalysts have done
countless times before, and in many cases, continue to do so. As we
shall see, upon emphasizing theoretical models provided by Deleuze and
Kaja Silverman's "Masochism and Male Subjectivity," Mattoso's poetic
voice represents the persona of a masochist who, rather than being the
victim of the torture he suffers, actively and consciously manipulates
his idealized, and, in fact, inexistent torturer. His ultimate objective
is to engage in fetishistic sexual encounters designed to worship the
power of the sadist while simultaneously seeking personal degradation
prompted by his own humiliation.

If the foot fetish is inextricably bound within the sexual contract
implicit in Mattoso's poetry, then we must also discuss theoretical
links between fetishism, sadism, and masochism, as well as the literary
renderings that Mattoso's most recent collection of poetry, CENTOPÉIA:
SONETOS NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS obsessively addresses. After examining
psychoanalytic and socio-economic manifestations of fetishism, sadism,
and masochism, this chapter will show how Mattoso's performative
perversity uses sadomasochism as a metaphor of selfhood and fetishism as
the object — the concrete avenue — to obtain subjectivity. In reading
and analyzing poems from CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS, I will
argue that at the core of Mattoso's project is the deliberate creation
of an unresolvable tension wherein the following paradox is sustained:
the poetic voice simultaneously depathologizes fetishism and
sadomasochism, rescuing them from the normative label of "perversity,"
just as he reasserts and perpetuates the radical aesthetics of
perversity itself, endlessly and successfully struggling to resist
normalization. In addition, this chapter will develop one of the
fundamental preoccupations of the thesis as a whole: the metaphoric use
of fetishism — and the antiphallocentric universe that results from
abandoning genital sexuality — to access culture in such a way that the
poet is able to discern elements of national character, "brasilidade,"
as well as arrive at generalizations about other cultures.

Before proceeding to examine boundaries between fetishism, sadism, and
masochism established by thinkers such as Deleuze and Silverman and, of
course, their poetic manifestations in Mattoso's CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS
NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS, it is necessary to examine two more general
dimensions of fetishism: psychoanalytic theories and Marxist (commodity)
fetishism. In some ways, Sigmund Freud's thoughts on fetishism, while
necessarily taken up and criticized by feminists as completely
male-centered, offer more insight and understanding than the stance
maintained by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) today. Whether
or not we accept the essential Freudian premise that a fetish is the
outcome of the infant or child's denial of the mother's lack of a penis,
the emotional and sexual consequences of such "disavowal," or object
substitution, are significant. The 1987 edition of the APA's DIAGNOSTIC
AND STATISTICAL MANUAL OF MENTAL DISORDERS (DSM-III-R) still defines
fetishism according to parameters prescribed by nineteenth-century
sexologists, such as Richard von Krafft-Ebing and Alfred Binet:
"Recurrent, intense, sexual urges and sexually arousing fantasies, of at
least six months' duration, involving the use of nonliving objects
(fetishes) [...] usually by themselves" (pp. 282-3: 302.81). [2] Not
only is the magical half-year timeline highly problematic but the use of
the word "nonliving" to definitionally characterize the fetish is a
disturbing one. Objectification of the hand or the foot or the ear or
the hair of one who is deemed sexually attractive may be just as likely
to occur as the worship of a pair of underwear or a sock. In either
case, simply because the sexualized articles of clothing or the enticing
body part is physically separate from the whole body (the total person)
who is the object of the fetishistic fantasies does not automatically
imply a sense of lifelessness or even detachment in the erotic impulses
generated.

Surely, the attachment to such objects or body parts may very well go
beyond the literal objectification that superficially presents itself,
potentially encompassing the "whole body" or even the essence of the
individual whose parts may well have been severed by the psychoanalyst
but not necessarily the fetishist. Indeed, as Robert J. Stoller
compassionately argues, in PAIN AND PASSION: A PSYCHOANALYST EXPLORES
THE WORLD OF S & M:


[Fetishistic practice is not inherently dehumanizing. Experience
suggests that fetishisms can play valuable roles within people's
eroticisms: constant, high attention to one's partner's experience is
more caring and safer than the blundering, ignorant, non-communicating
obtuseness that governs so many 'normal' people's erotic motions.] (21)


Whitney Davis, in his article, "HomoVision: A Reading of Freud's
'Fetishism'," endorses Stoller's fetish-affirming perspective,
emphasizing the ability of the fetishist to both maintain his health
(and his life) in the era of AIDS and other potentially fatal sexual
diseases, as well as the fetishist's transcendence of the scripted
behaviors warranted by one's expected adherence to genital sexuality:


[Such humane fetishisms might be becoming more common than ever in the
context of the revolutionary reconfiguration of erotic practice in
recent 'safe sex.' For many gay men today, far from 'dehumanizing' the
sexual partner, fetishism develops as an interest in him precisely as a
man with a past, present, and possible future — a local dismembering of
aspects of genital sexuality in the service of a far greater, more
important remembering.] (109)


If fetishism is connected to the emergence of Western interpretations of
sexual difference, it is also linked to the formation and perception of
class differences in modern society. This logic is the initial premise
upon which Karl Marx's notion of "commodity fetishism" rests. In the
first volume of CAPITAL, Marx argues that one of the essential flaws of
the capitalistic enterprise is that a sense of value is displaced from
the laborers who produce an object to the actual things themselves. The
articles, of practical value to the consumer, are then imbued with an
overvaluation which supersedes the actual utility of the product. In
other words, the producer, in the act of production, is stripped of
value, resulting in both the dehumanization of the producer as a
contributing individual and the projection of excessive value onto the
object itself. As Lorraine Gamman and Merja Makinen summarize, in FEMALE
FETISHISM, "Marx describes this as fetishism because, as in religion, a
human product [...] acquires a life of its own, and enters into
relations both with other things of its kind and with the human race"
(28).

Somewhat paradoxically, Robert Stoller, quoted above as writing from a
psychoanalytic perspective where he refreshingly embraces the positive
ramifications of fetishism for reasons already mentioned, also bridges
the alienation of Marxist commodity fetishism with that experienced by
the object of the fetishist's sexual affection, claiming that the two
are parallel experiences. Just as the laborer becomes dissociated with
her end product and is therefore dehumanized, sexual fetishism is
conceived as a process during which, as Davis states, "the sexual
laborer is alienated from the appropriate product of his or her work —
namely, mutual recognition by and love of the other person" (117).
Stoller's attempt to link commodity fetishism with sexual fetishism
ultimately subscribes to the lifelessness of the exchange and therefore
to the standard psychoanalytic evaluation of fetishism as perversion.

Without embarking upon an extensive commentary of the pre-Freudian and
Freudian psychoanalytic theories of fetishism, a process previously
undertaken by countless projects in various disciplines, this
dissertation proposes an application of E.L. McCallum's configuration of
fetishism as an avenue to attain postmodern subjectivity to Mattoso's
poetic universe. [3] The motif of fetishism is most notable in
CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS, a collection of 100 Camonian
(heroic) sonnets, where the precise decasyllabic pattern is rigorously
and consistently (perhaps one can even say fetishistically) maintained
throughout all of the poems. [4] The unifying themes addressed in this
work are as obsessively repetitive as the rigid model in which they are
placed: the homoerotic love of the male foot and the simultaneous
cultivation and lamentation of masochistic suffering. The entire
collection was composed in 1999 over a period of three months and then
published shortly thereafter. In light of the discussion above, it may
indeed be most appropriate to begin with a discussion of the "Soneto
Psicanalítico," where Mattoso parodically addresses the work of Freud on
fetishism:


SONETO 28 PSICANALÍTICO

Não tem muitos mistérios o meu ego:
O pé, símbolo fálico evidente,
ilustra todo o tal do inconsciente
com sonhos coloridos, pois sou cego.

Se existe algum complexo que carrego,
de Édipo não era, certamente.
O nome grego só me vem à mente
porque "pé inchado" é o étimo que pego.

É de inferioridade o meu complexo,
explica Freud, e, à luz do que analisa,
a fixação no pé ganha seu nexo.

Só há libido quando alguém me pisa.
Sola na cara é estímulo do sexo.
Mais grossa a sola, mais a língua é lisa.


PSYCHOANALYTIC SONNET (#28)

My ego does not have many mysteries:
The foot, an evident phallic symbol,
illustrates the whole of that so-called "unconscious"
with colored dreams, because I'm blind.

If there's any complex that I carry,
it isn't Oedipus, surely.
The Greek name only comes to mind
because "swollen foot" is the etymological meaning I take.

It is of inferiority the complex of mine,
explains Freud, and in light of his analysis,
the foot fixation makes sense.

Libido only exists when someone steps on me.
Sole on the face is sex stimulus.
The rougher the sole, the smoother the tongue.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


Mattoso's poetic voice, as is the case with the majority of poems in
CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS NOJENTOS & QUEJANDOS, takes a confessional tone,
openly admitting an inferiority complex. At the same time, the poet
proudly demystifies the complexity of psychoanalytic theories of
fetishism by stating, quite simply, that the foot is the phallic symbol
to which he subscribes. The opening verse, alerting the reader
immediately that to understand his "ego" is anything but complicated,
enhances the naturalization or normalization of the "perversity" being
reclaimed. The simplistic words and frank language, "O pé, símbolo
fálico evidente / ilustra todo o tal do inconsciente" sarcastically cut
the psychoanalyst to the chase, for in the ownership of his fetish, the
poetic voice requests no diagnosis of its origins nor does he desire
recommendations to "normalize" his aberration. However, it is quite
clear that the poet does not merely see the foot as an instrument to
attain erotic satisfaction. His "libido," he claims, will be stimulated
only once he becomes humiliated during the sexual encounter. The foot,
then, is imbued not only with aesthetic sensuality and eroticism but
also with violence and subjugation — the power to step on, to crush, to
reduce the inflated ego of a classical sonnetist to the role of human
doormat.

This sonnet summarizes Mattoso's use of foot fetishism as an avenue to
attain masochistic fantasies of degradation. In the colloquialization of
complex psychoanalytic concepts like "Édipo" and "libido," Mattoso
effectively subverts the cerebral intellectualizations under which
fetishism is evaluated and judged, reducing the jargon to its bare
elements in order to access a natural and potent eroticism. The formula
for sexual stimulation is a simple one, which does not directly involve
using genitality. The sexual exchange consists of the scent and the feel
of the sole of a man's foot, for the self-acknowledged blindness of the
poetic voice deprives him of any visual satisfaction. Because he cannot
see in a conscious mode, the "sonhos coloridos," the ability to dream in
color, heightens his erotic imagination. For me, the "sonhos coloridos"
are a metaphor for a sort of compensation; the colorfulness of fantasies
is enhanced since his access to the visual is now permanently deprived.
In any case, the actions themselves are clearly specified: the bottom of
the foot is treated to a bath performed by the poet's tongue. The
encounter is not — need not be — developed any further. Within the
framework of conventional genital sexuality, such a scene would be
undoubtedly viewed as perverse — even if it occurred between
heterosexual partners. More importantly, even if the actions of the
event were not judgmentally assessed, they would most certainly be
perceived as a prelude to further sexual activity, an act of "foreplay"
or the sexualized "brincadeira" or "sacanagem" in Brazilian Portuguese.
Mattoso's sonnet is frozen at the moment where the tongue makes contact
with the sole of the foot, implying that the climax, the height of
passion for the poetic voice, occurs at precisely this point.


(b) SADISM, MASOCHISM, AND FETISHISM: CONNECTIONS AND DISCONNECTIONS


O sadomasoquismo é uma quimera.
O verdadeiro sádico é carrasco,
diverte-se causando dor ou asco,
contanto que não seja o que o outro espera.

Masoca pra valer não delibera,
atira-se sem medo do penhasco,
atura pisoteio até dum casco
e, numa arena, nunca escolhe a fera.

Querer que se completem é besteira,
pois o prazer do escravo frustra o dono,
e um cara só tortura quem não queira.

O jeito é o fingimento, e finjo sono
sabendo que o demônio da cegueira
vem me causar a insônia e o abandono.

("Soneto Consensual," 2.93)


CONSENSUAL SONNET (#93)

Sadomasochism is a chimera.
The true sadist is cruel,
who has fun by inflicting pain or sickness,
provided that the victim doesn't desire this treatment.

The real masochist doesn't deliberate.
He throws himself fearlessly from the cliff.
He bears even the stomping of hooves,
and in an arena never chooses the beast.

It's bullshit to see them as a complete couple,
because the slave's pleasure frustrates the master,
and a guy only tortures those who don't want it.

The solution is to pretend, and I pretend to sleep
knowing that the demon of blindness
will come to bring me insomnia and abandonment.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


Because this thesis is concerned with performative aspects of Mattoso's
poetic identities, it is important to look more closely at the labels
often thrown around in order to arrive at a more specific
conceptualization of fetishism, sadism, and masochism as individual as
well as interdependent entities. This precision will allow us to
contemplate whether or not fetishism is sadomasochistic in nature and,
for our purposes, in Mattoso's sonnets. Most importantly, I will
illustrate how Mattoso views S & M as a metaphor of selfhood and
exploits fetishism to attain individuation and, ultimately, a profound
sense of poetic and personal autonomy.

Deleuze offers an interesting analogy when he equates the sadist's role
as that of "instructor" and the masochist as "educator." While the
differences may not appear significant on a superficial level, Deleuze
convincingly argues that they are indeed vast. Essentially, he proposes
that the sadist typically dictates actions while the masochist's chosen
realm of influence is that of persuasion:


[The sadist [...] demonstrate[s] that reasoning itself is a form of
violence, and that he is on the side of violence, however calm and
logical he may be [...] In the work of Masoch [...] we are dealing
instead with a victim in search of a torturer and who needs to educate,
persuade and conclude an alliance with the torturer in order to realize
the strangest of schemes. This is why advertisements are part of the
language of masochism while they have no place in true sadism, and why
the masochist draws up contracts while the sadist abominates and
destroys them. The sadist is in need of institutions, the masochist of
contractual relations.] (18-20)


The common misperception that the sadist is the perfect partner for the
masochist and vice-versa is systematically destroyed in the analysis of
Deleuze and other philosophers. Most recently, Anita Phillips' long
essay, A DEFENCE OF MASOCHISM, abruptly maintains that "the masochist
and the sadist are an impossible couple" (11). Deleuze and Phillips hold
many similar views, particularly with respect to sadism and the roles of
the sadist; however, they are markedly different in their perceptions of
the masochist. While Deleuze repeatedly argues that the masochist is
speaking from — and is, in fact, empowered by — the standpoint of
victim, Phillips believes the contrary, asserting that "the masochist is
a conscious manipulator, not a victim" (19). Phillips rather
convincingly reveals that the masochist is often in charge, actively
seeking punishment and pursuing partners who will faithfully fulfill
that desire. In each of the scenarios she portrays, making specific
references to Sade's ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY DAYS OF SODOM and, more
frequently, Masoch's VENUS IN FURS as well as alluding to personal
experiences and interviews, Phillips never transcends the boundary of
monogamous masochism; by her definition, the bonafide masochist will
only make contractual agreements with one other person and for a
specified time period. The rigidity implied in the periodicity and the
prerequisite of contractual relations that resonates among both critics
and proponents of sadomasochistic behaviors is reminiscent of the
discussion of fetishism earlier in this chapter, when it was pointed out
that an absurdly incomplete definition of fetishism is provided by the
American Psychiatric Association. Deleuze's desperate attempts to
undermine the illusion of "the sadomasochistic entity" result in a
virtually endless list of dualities, a polarization between sadism and
masochism whose rigidity itself reeks of reductionism and
over-simplification. For example, when summarizing the most essential
differences between sadism and masochism, Deleuze goes so far as to
assert without further elaboration that "there is an aestheticism in
masochism, while sadism is hostile to the aesthetic attitude." What,
frankly, is meant by the phrase "the aesthetic attitude"? Sadism and
masochism may be linked or identified with differing aesthetic
characteristics, but such a monolithic conception of THE aesthetic
posture is just as disturbing and problematic as "THE sadomasochistic
entity," the indiscriminate and careless combining of the two terms
which Deleuze tries to deconstruct. On the other hand, Deleuze's efforts
to highlight the separateness of sadism and masochism are admirable, for
it is still quite rare to find a contemporary critic who is sensitive to
discerning such differences. Paul Mann's overly simplistic definition
provided in MASOCRITICISM is a case in point: "Masochism is primary
sadism turned inward; sadism is primary masochism turned outward" (27).

In Mattoso's poetry, the roles and responsibilities of sadist and
masochist are far more fluid in nature, as we shall see below in our
discussion of three sonnets from CENTOPÉIA: SONETOS NOJENTOS &
QUEJANDOS. "Soneto Sádico" is one of the few poems in the collection
that makes no allusion to the eroticized foot. In fact, sexuality is not
even overtly included until the final stanza. Its bitter verses reveal a
cruel poetic voice who seeks satisfaction and perhaps revenge in
observing the suffering of political authorities. However, the
gratification he derives is grounded in the mind rather than the body:


SONETO 17 SÁDICO

Legal é ver político morrendo
de câncer, quer na próstata ou no reto,
e, pra que meu prazer seja completo,
tenha um tumor na língua como adendo.

Se for ministro, então, não me arrependo
de ser-lhe muito mais que um desafeto,
rogar-lhe morte igual à que um inseto
na mão da molecada vai sofrendo.

Mas o melhor de tudo é o presidente
ser desmoralizado na risada
por quem faz poesia como a gente.

Ele nos fode a cada canetada,
mas eu, usando só o poder da mente,
espeto-lhe o loló com minha espada.


SADIC SONNET (#17)

It's nice to see a politician dying
of cancer, either from the prostate or the rectum,
and, for my complete pleasure,
having a tumor on the tongue, in addition.

If he's a minister of state, then, I don't regret
being more than an enemy to him,
wishing him dead like an insect
suffering in the hands of kids.

But the best of all is to have the president
being demoralized by laughter
from those who make poetry like us.

He fucks us at each stroke of the pen,
but I, only using the power of mind,
impale his ass with my sword.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


This sonnet, calling for a sort of solidarity among poets, highlights
the intellectual power of the poetic office/trade; that is, the ability
to use words as weapons, in this case aimed at destroying or
demoralizing public officials. The final three verses construct an image
of violent sodomy to counterattack the crooked politician, "espeto-lhe o
loló com minha espada," as a metaphor for the destructive capabilities
Mattoso attributes to the power of the pen. Political satire is an art
cultivated by a long legacy of poets writing in the tradition of
transgression, of which Mattoso is merely one of its most recent
members. As we have seen in the second chapter, transgressive poets like
Gregório de Mattos certainly did not earn the title of "Boca do Inferno"
in vain.

Politicians remain the object of Mattoso's hostility in "Soneto
Masoquista,"on the next page of the collection:


SONETO 18 MASOQUISTA

Político só quer nos ver morrendo
na merda, ao deus-dará, sem voz, sem teto.
Divertem-se inventando outro projeto
de imposto que lhes renda um dividendo.

São tão filhos da puta que só vendo,
capazes de criar até decreto
que obrigue o pobre, o cego, o analfabeto
a dar mais do que vinha recebendo.

Se a coisa continua nesse pé,
acabo transformado no engraxate
dum senador qualquer, dum zé mané.

Vou ser levado, a menos que me mate,
à torpe obrigação de amar chulé,
lamber feito cachorro que não late.


MASOCHIST SONNET (#18)

Politicians only want to watch us dying
in the gutter, helpless, voiceless, homeless.
They amuse themselves by scheming new taxation laws
which will garner them more profits.

They're such complete motherfuckers!
They're even capable of enacting a decree
which makes the poor, the blind, the illiterate
give more than what they've been earning.

If things remain like this,
I will end up reduced to a shoe-shiner
to any senator or to any So-and-So too.

Unless I kill myself, I'll be subjected
to the lowly duty of loving toejam,
licking like a dog that doesn't bark.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


The first two stanzas of the sonnet are highly characteristic of the
poetry of social protest written especially in the 1960s and 70s by
poets like Haroldo de Campos, Augusto de Campos, Ferreira Gullar, and
many other contemporary Brazilian poets who have produced
socially-themed poetry. The first eight verses lament the corruption and
insensitivity of public officials and decry the suffering and pain of
the disenfranchised, whether marginalized by poverty, disability, or
illiteracy. In the second half of the poem, however, an entirely
different tone emerges, one in which the poetic voice desires to be on
the receiving end of the humiliation perpetrated by the
senator-torturer, proposing a contract wherein he promises to love the
toe-jam ("amar chulé"), or use his tongue to polish the feet of the
senator. The resulting image is one of total submission, for the
metaphor is not only that of a dog obediently licking his master but,
indeed, a dog who does not bark; that is, one who joyfully welcomes his
own humiliation without any inclination to protest the abuses which may
result from becoming a bath-giver to clean the literal and metaphorical
dirt off the toes of his oppressor. The transitional verse, "Se a coisa
continua nesse pé" is an excellent example of how Mattoso's absurd and
humorous word games, explored in the discussion of the JORNAL DOBRABIL
in chapter four, are evident even in his classical sonnets. The
incorporation of such puns into such a refined, conventional poetic form
makes their presence even more transgressive, for they sardonically mock
the very seriousness of the classical Camonian model. Mattoso's "Soneto
Estudantil" is undoubtedly a poetic expression of the extensive research
that went into his 1985 sociological work, O CALVÁRIO DOS CARECAS:
HISTÓRIA DO TROTE ESTUDANTIL. [5] In addition to clearly delineating
roles of master and slave, torturer and tortured, Mattoso reveals in
this poem an apparent agreement with Phillips' perspective that the
masochist, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, is better defined
as manipulator than as victim:


SONETO 52 ESTUDANTIL

O trote é tradição na academia,
mas já foi mais cruel na Idade Média.
A vida de calouro era a tragédia
do "escravo", enquanto o "dono" o usava e ria.

Sofri na própria carne essa agonia,
porém contrariei a enciclopédia
no dia em que tramei uma comédia
fingindo entrar naquela engenharia.

Calouro disfarçado, fui tratado
que nem um bicho, a chute, "Xô!" e chicote,
lambendo o veterano pé suado.

É claro que não fiz nenhum fricote!
Assim é que eu queria ser usado!
Fui eu quem lhes passou o maior trote!


STUDENT SONNET (#52)

Hazing is a tradition in the academy,
but it was more cruel in the Middle Ages.
The freshman's life was the tragedy
of the "slave," while the "master" used him and laughed.

I suffered in my own skin this agony,
but I contradicted the encyclopoedia
on the day I schemed a comedy
pretending I was taking engineering.

A disguised freshman, I was treated
like an animal, with kicks, "Shoo!" and whippings,
licking the veteran's sweaty foot.

Of course I didn't make any fuss!
That's how I wanted to be used!
It was I who played them the dirtiest trick!

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


As is customary in Mattoso's sonnets, the epitome of his transgressive
expression is thoroughly revealed only in the final stanza, where, in
this case, he subverts the victimization of the initiate. He applauds
his own successful manipulation of his oppressor, actually soliciting
and directing the abuse he receives at the feet of the sadist. Contrary
to the common belief that the masochist is victim, the poetic voice in
this poem, performing the deceptive role of "calouro disfarçado," is in
total command of the situation. Indeed, the irony evident in the final
three verses causes the reader to pause and contemplate fluid roles of
perpetrator and victim. The "sacanagem" has been successfully inverted;
Mattoso's ultimate pleasure apparently stems from making a victim out of
the torturer and in affirming that the masochist indeed has the upper
hand in the exchange.

The time has come to consider if and where fetishism fits within the
larger realm of sadomasochism in Mattoso's poetic universe. While
referring specifically to foot fetishism in his article, "Aversion /
Perversion / Diversion," cultural studies critic Samuel Delany argues
for the necessity to separate reciprocal foot fetishism from any
automatic association with sadomasochism:


[The myth of the sexual fetish is precisely that it is solitary. Its
assumed pathology is the fact it is thought to be non-reciprocal. A
major symptom of the general insensitivity of our extant sexual
vocabulary is that as soon as fetishism is presumed to move into the
realm of reciprocity, the vocabulary and analytical schema of
sadomasochism takes it over; and to me this seems wholly to contravene
common sense and my own experience.] (15)


Deleuze's analysis fundamentally agrees with Delany's intuitive sense
that fetishism should be disentangled from sadomasochism, for reasons
mentioned earlier, namely that such a definition contributes to the
mistaken configuration of the all-perversion-encompassing
"sadomasochistic entity." However, in trying to determine whether
fetishism is more closely related to masochism or sadism, Deleuze
arrives at the conclusion that "fetishism, as defined by the process of
disavowal and suspension of belief belongs essentially to masochism"
(32). He makes a very important distinction, one that Mattoso's work
seems to echo consistently: it is necessary to separate an individual's
violence toward the fetish itself from her deliberate choice of a
violent fetish. Deleuze gives the example of "hair despoiling" as the
type of fetish which may be specifically chosen because of the sadistic
element — the infliction of pain — that sexual enactments using this
fetish would precipitate. He arrives at the conclusion that a fetish may
be exploited negatively to become an agent in a sadistic act but that,
standing on its own, masochism bears a far more profound relation to
fetishism in the sense that it shares elements of disavowal and suspense
(the frozen moments or obsessive-compulsive scripts that characterize
the sexual stimulation provided by the fetish). While Deleuze can find
little evidence of fetishism in his analyses of Sade's works, he notes
that Masoch consistently uses specific fetishes in his works (especially
in VENUS IN FURS) as well as his life: furs, shoes, the whip, helmets
and other disguises used to dress his lover (33).

As Lorraine Gamman and Merja Makinen point out, the problem of
conflating fetishism with sadomasochism may have originated at the end
of the nineteenth century, when psychoanalysts often did not distinguish
these "perversions" from one another. The authors allude specifically to
the work of Paul Garnier, who coined carelessly hybridized terms like
"sadi-fetichism" and "maso-fetichism." The authors lament that such
misunderstanding has continued into the twentieth century: "The word
'fetishism' itself, in contemporary usage, has virtually become a
blanket term to characterize all erotic fixations or obsessions seen as
'perverse'" (52). Even writers who claim to possess a liberal or
non-judgmental stance on sadomasochism and fetishism are often involved
in perpetuating the blanket generalizations that Gamman and Makinen
point out. A careful analysis of Anita Phillips' definition of the
experiences of a masochistic lover during a sexual encounter reveals
that the author is indeed fetishizing masochism itself: "This kind of
lover [the masochist] does not fully believe in the reality of the
other, expects them to disappear suddenly or treats them like a
photograph, a representation of something that is already in the past.
The masochistic lover is in mourning even though the beloved is not
dead" (58). This characterization echoes, once again, the APA's
conceptualization of the lifelessness of the fetish and the fetishist's
alleged detachment from the here and now, the wholeness of the body and
mind of the partner he is fetishizing.

Mattoso uses the foot fetish to construct a bridge — a marriage so to
speak — of sadism with masochism. His "Soneto Chinês" demonstrates that
the foot is an almost mystical emblem of eroticism — and particularly
sadomasochism — throughout Chinese history:


SONETO 33 CHINÊS

Na China milenar o pé tem sido
exemplo bom de sadomasoquismo.
Bastante é examinar com que estoicismo
as fêmeas o atrofiam, sem gemido.

Se nas mulheres é diminuído,
nos homens é atributo do machismo:
Nas artes marciais o simbolismo
da perda é o pé na cara do vencido.

Masturbo-me, isolado, e fico a fim,
pejado no vexame da cegueira,
de sujeitar-me aos pés dum mandarim.

Na China a vida não é brincadeira.
Um cego no subúrbio de Pequim
só serve quando vai lamber frieira.


CHINESE SONNET (#33)

In millenary China the foot has been
a good example of sadomasochism.
It's enough to examine the stoicism
of women who atrophy their feet, without groaning.

If, in the women, the foot is diminished,
in men it is an attribute to masculinity:
In martial arts the symbolism
of defeat is the foot on the loser's face.

Isolated, I masturbate, longing,
ashamed by the humiliation of my blindness,
to subject myself to a Mandarin's feet.

In China life is not easy.
A blind man in the suburbs of Peking
is only useful when licking chilblains.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


Not only does the poet use the metaphor of the foot to symbolize and
generalize practices of sexual domination and submission throughout
Chinese civilization, but he also exploits the image to derive gender
constructs that are specific to the nation he is characterizing.
Furthermore, he successfully subverts Deleuze's theory which holds the
suffering position to be almost exclusively male. In ancient Chinese
culture, women have stoically accepted foot-binding as part of their
submission to the sexual desires of the males. The dainty female foot,
virtually crushed and broken into its tiny size, is juxtaposed against
the image of the cruel fighting feet of the male. The foot in the face
of the defeated opponent or foe represents a phallic victory just as the
penis is used to represent the violence and "machismo" of patriarchy. In
other words, Mattoso inscribes the human foot with the same
(self-)destructive powers used to define male and female sex organs in
conventional psychoanalytic theories.

In her article, "Transgression: The 'Safe Word' in S/M Discourses," Liz
Day asserts that "the sign of the failing penis is the emblematic mask
of postmodern subjectivity" (247). In her discussion on the attempts of
surrealism to rehabilitate the contributions of Sade, Day argues that
sadomasochism came to be viewed as a metaphor of the autonomous self
wherein the level of transgressiveness is defined in direct
proportionality to the embracing of the "otherness" within the self that
has been repressed by psychoanalysis. In other words, the self was seen
as a composite of its own repressions and is, therefore, ontologically
linked to its libido. This perspective is a deeply problematic one, for
it tries to align identity of self with libido yet offers little
elaboration of the complex questions that inevitably result from
perceiving the self in almost exclusively sexualized terms. In her
analysis of Bataille and Lacan, Day finds that "the transgressing of
limits becomes the truth of male subjectivity in an economy of 'sex' as
truth" (250). E.L. McCallum offers a more optimistic treatment of this
relationship, one that includes women. She argues that fetishism may
also be used as a strategy to maximize the complexity of individual
sexualities to the point where simplistic polarized views on sex and
sexuality can be successfully subverted or at least revealed to be
severely limited in representing the wealth of human diversity:


[Fetishism as an epistemological strategy situated in a fluid
interpretation of sexual differences proffers a possible resolution to
the political problem of equality versus difference. As a third way to
figure sexual difference, fetishism can strategically complicate a
binary gender system, reinstating an excluded middle and foregrounding
the narrow gender ideals which subtend claims both for oppression and
for freedom.] (44)


Often judged by psychoanalysis as an obsessive, limiting domain whereby
the practitioner is condemned to continuously repeat his aberrant sexual
behaviors, fetishism is here reconfigured as a way to access and
eventually celebrate divergent identities.

Mattoso's "Soneto Autobiográfico" defines a poetic voice who sees his
present-day masochism and foot fetishism as inevitable outcomes of the
sadistic events he suffered as a child. One of the few poems in the
collection that is concerned with tracing identity to traumatic
experiences in formative years, this poem neither glorifies his own
sexual uniqueness nor judges it. He is primarily concerned with
clarifying that he did not choose any of the sexual facets of his
identity. They emerged, rather, as a cause-and-effect relationship
between the past and the present:


SONETO 20 AUTOBIOGRÁFICO

Um fato me marcou pra toda a vida:
aos nove anos fui vítima dos caras
mais velhos, que brincavam com as taras,
levando-me da escola pra avenida.

Curravam-me num beco sem saída,
zoavam inventando coisas raras,
como lamber sebinho em suas varas
e encher a minha boca de cuspida.

O que dava mais nojo era a poeira
da sola dos seus tênis, misturada
com doce, pão, cocô ou xepa de feira.

O gosto do solado e da calçada
na língua fez de mim, queira ou não queira,
a escória dos podólatras, mais nada.


AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SONNET (#20)

An episode marked me for life:
When nine, I was the victim of older guys
who played with perversions,
taking me from school to the avenue.

They used to rape me in a dead end alley,
they used to bully, inventing bizarre things,
like licking cock-cheese from their dicks
and filling my mouth with spit.

What disgusted me more was the dust
from their sneakers' sole, mixed
with candy, bread, shit, or market's scraps.

The taste from the sole and the sidewalk
on my tongue made me, like it or not,
into the scum of the footlovers, and into nothing else.

(translated by Akira Nishimura; see also "Soneto Primário" clicking
[SELECTED SONNETS])


The phrase "queira ou não queira" clearly alludes to a decision to
reserve judgment, to remain neutral on the repercussions and
consequences of the abuses suffered as a child. The verb "brincar"
appears in this poem as it does in so many of Mattoso's works. Its usage
is reminiscent of the semi-serious, semi-ludic exploitation of the term
in Mário de Andrade's MACUNAÍMA, one of the most fundamental texts
written during Brazilian Modernism. In the sense it is used here,
"brincavam com as taras," the reader may infer an experimental sense of
playfulness, in which the acts highlighted in the poem may be sadistic
in nature but not entirely uninnocent. After all, even though the abuse
was not perpetrated by peers belonging to the age group of the poetic
voice, they are still characterized as "caras mais velhos" and elsewhere
as "moleques." Surely, this chapter need not elaborate upon the tendency
of children to be cruel to others perceived as weaker, inferior, or
different in any way. The abundance of grotesque and violent images of
coerced subjugation in this poem does not function as an apology for an
identity assumed in the present but rather a rational explanation for
the possession of such aberrant desires. Becoming "the scum of the foot
worshippers" is a self-attributed title in which the poetic voice seems
to derive great pride and satisfaction.

Other interrelated facets of the performative identities of the poetic
voice appear throughout the collection. In "Soneto Solado," for example,
Mattoso characterizes, for the first time in his poetic universe, his
own blindness as an integral element of masochism and self-degradation.
Strangely, the poem, in the form of an advertisement of services
addressed to one who possesses authority over him — half-heroically,
half-cowardly — seems to transcend the physical and emotional pain of
irreversible glaucoma into a sexualized outcome which only solidifies
the desire to suffer self-inflicted and other-solicited cruelties. But
the poet, of course, manipulates the tragedy of his blindness to
heighten the will to suffer:


SONETO 12 SOLADO

Patrão, posso engraxar o seu pisante?
Sapato, bota ou tênis, tanto faz.
Não cobro nada e limpo até demais,
pois vou lambendo e o pé fica brilhante.

Bem sei que meu serviço é degradante.
Sou cego, o que me humilha ainda mais.
Mas é assim que a coisa satisfaz
alguém como você, tão arrogante.

Na sola minha língua se revela
o mais macio e sórdido capacho.
Você vai ver a cena numa tela:

Ao vivo ou não, Patrão, eu só lhe engraxo,
me imaginando preso numa cela,
porque cê tem visão e pé de macho.


SOLED SONNET (#12)

Sir, may I shine your footwear?
Shoe, boot or sneaker, it doesn't matter.
I don't charge anything and I clean pretty good,
'cause I go licking and the foot gets bright.

I know too well that my job is degrading.
I'm blind, and that humiliates me even more.
But that's the way things are to satisfy
someone like you, so arrogant.

Under the sole my tongue reveals itself
the smoothest and the most sordid doormat.
You'll see the scene on a screen:

Live or not, Sir, I only shine you,
imagining myself locked in a cell,
because you have eyesight and a man's foot.

(translated by Akira Nishimura)


Certainly, the poem satisfies the Deleuzian prerequisite of a
contractual arrangement initiated by the masochist-victim. The poetic
voice deepens his own degradation by adding his blindness to the
equation of inferiority. Almost as if his physical condition provides
further justification for his unchosen masochism, blindness is treated
as yet another symbol of humiliation within the larger inferiority
complex that Mattoso carefully constructs. Sustaining a
self-imprisonment that simultaneously evokes bitterness and
gratification, the poetic voice is fully conscious of his desire to
suffer and to serve as "capacho" (door-mat) to an arrogant man who is
defined as superior merely because of his ability to see and because of
his eroticized feet. In the Mattosian poetic universe, feet come to
symbolize virility and power, for they alone are in full connection and
have complete command over the dirt and filth that they tread upon.


[NOTES]

[1] See [SOURCES]. For Butterman's introduction and contents, see
[A TRANSGRESSOR AS CASE STUDY].

[2] Krafft-Ebing is credited with the first discussion of sexual
fetishism. In 1886, he authored the PSYCHOPATHIA SEXUALIS: WITH ESPECIAL
REFERENCE TO THE ANTIPATHIC SEXUAL INSTINCT, A MEDICO-FORENSIC STUDY,
which essentially pathologized fetishism, examining its capacity to
provoke the fetishist to commit crimes motivated by his perverse
object-identification. Gamman and Makinen relate that Krafft-Ebing is
considered to be "the true founder of modern sexual pathology" (50).
Krafft-Ebing's research consisted of analyzing the behavior of
thirty-six men who were deemed to be "pathological fetishists" because
they eroticized female body parts not "normally" associated with genital
sexuality. The "physiological fetishist" was defined as the healthy man
attracted to organs directly related to sex, deemed as normal even if,
for example, he is hopelessly fixated on the breasts. Alfred Binet
published his article, "Le Fetichisme dans l'amour" one year later
(1887), in which he separated fetishism into two categories – the
"sexual" and the "religious." His condemnation of the sexual type was
particularly severe, conceptualizing the fetishist as one who is
incapable of loving any individual as a whole person and is instead
lustfully fixated only on a particular body part, investing it with
excessive value. Binet makes no distinctions, however, between love and
lust.

[3] It is beyond the scope of this dissertation to elaborate complex
psychoanalytic models of fetishism since Freud. The reader may choose to
refer to Lorraine Gamman and Merja Makinen's FEMALE FETISHISM,
especially pp. 38-46 and Marcia Ian's REMEMBERING THE PHALLIC MOTHER:
PSYCHOANALYSIS, MODERNISM, AND THE FETISH, especially pp. 50-3, for
further information on traditional psychoanalytic models of fetishism.
For specific definitions of the important Freudian process of
"disavowal" (fetishistic object-substitution), Gilles Deleuze's
MASOCHISM: COLDNESS AND CRUELTY is particularly useful, especially pp.
32-3 and 72. See [BIBLIOGRAPHY] for complete citations.

[4] The form of the classical Camonian sonnet has already been examined
in chapter four. [See COLLAGE AND BRICOLAGE] However, it is important
to mention a few of Camões' most repetitive motifs, for each of them
bears the mark of seriousness: ephemerality of nature; lamentation of
aging; love; and religious devotion. In addition, Mattoso's work
frequently follows the Camonian precedent of developing the fullness of
the theme or topic of each sonnet within the final three verses of the
last stanza.

[5] Click [THE ESSAYIST OF "TRANSGRESSIONISM"] for Butterman's analysis
of "Mattoso's most ambitious sociological study."

° ° °