Part 1
# Seductio Ad Absurdum: The Principles & Practices of Seduction, A Beginner's Handbook ### By Hahn, Emily
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SEDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM
(“Now I lay me—” OLD PRAYER)
In preparation THE SEDUCER’S _VENI MECUM_ A COURSE FOR ADVANCED STUDENTS
SEDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM
The Principles & Practices of Seduction
A Beginner’s Handbook
_by Emily Hahn_
1930
New York BREWER AND WARREN INC. PAYSON & CLARKE LTD.
COPYRIGHT, 1930, BY EMILY HAHN
First Printing before Publication March 1930 Second Printing before Publication March 1930
SET UP, ELECTROTYPED, PRINTED AND BOUND IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY H. WOLFF ESTATE, NEW YORK, N. Y.
DEDICATED TO HERBERT ASBURY WHO TOLD ME TO WRITE IT DOWN
INTRODUCTION
Although seduction as an applied art has been slowly developing over a period of several generations, the science of seduction has so far been largely neglected. While the value of the empirical knowledge acquired by early practitioners and transmitted to us by a great body of folk-lore should not be minimized, the trial and error methods of these precursors, both amateur and professional, are to be deplored as crude; for however refined they may have been in application, there is evidence that they were lacking in that exactness in observation which could make them valuable to science.
Only a very few though hardy pioneers have in the past, recognized the necessity for organizing man’s empirical knowledge of this vast subject on a rational basis, and it is due to their unselfish labours alone that we now have a sufficient body of observed phenomena, a sufficient accumulation of data, to make possible the beginnings of a true science of seduction. It is the purpose of this book, to co-ordinate the efforts of these for the most part anonymous and forgotten contributors, these modest, silent benefactors, and to attempt a proper classification within the subject: to adumbrate such practical methods of procedure as may in the, let us hope, near future develop into a sure technique. Owing to the limitations of space and the present confused state of the subject, it is of necessity only possible here to indicate the lines which such a development must follow. It is my desire to confine this work to a purely practical consideration of the subject, and to make it a handbook in the hope that my students and those who come after me will be the better able to add to the body of our observed knowledge of seduction and to indicate the more clearly for my shortcomings along what lines improvement is required.
WHAT IS SEDUCTION?
In the first place, the word itself is unfortunately obscure, possessing an ambiguity which we must resolve before we can proceed. I have assembled an assortment of representative definitions, which follows:
Se-duce (se-dus) _v.t._; SE-DUCED (se-dust); SE-DUCING (-dusing). [L. _seducere, seductum; se-aside_—_ducere_ to lead. See DUKE.] I. To lead aside or astray, esp. from the path of rectitude or duty; to entice to evil; to corrupt.
“For me, the gold of France did not _seduce_.” —_Shakespeare_ —_Webster’s New International Dictionary_
Seduce, _v.t._ Lead astray, tempt into sin or crime, corrupt; persuade (woman) into surrender of chastity, debauch.
—_Concise Oxford Dictionary_
Seduire: _v.a._ (du lat. _seducere_, conduire à l’écart. Se conj. comme _conduire_). Faire tomber en erreur ou en faute par ses insinuations, ses exemples.
—_Larousse_
Seduccion: Acciôn y effecto de seducir. Seducfr: Engañar con are y maña, persuadir suavemente al mal.
—_Enciclopedia Universal Illustrada_.
Sedurre (Seduzione, n) Ridurre con vane o false apparenze al nostre valere e al male.
—_Dizionario Universale delta Lingua Italiana. Petrocchi_
Verfiihrung; in geschlechtlicher Beziehung ein Mädchen verführen.
—_Deutsches Wörterbuch ... Heynes_
It is obvious that these interpretations all suffer from a common fault: they fail to reflect the modern ramifications of the word. As a matter of fact, seduction is undergoing a great change.
The rudiments of the custom may be observed in the remnants of primitive society that we are able to study. Certain aboriginal tribes practise polyandry as an economic adjustment to the surplus of males.[1] With the development of civilization we find that adaptation tends to take the form of matriarchy, as in the United States.[2]
In the early days of our culture, seduction was practised upon certain species of recognized placer in the social system, and thus attained a certain grade of standardization. There were the seduced (always the feminine sex) and the seducers (masculine). It would appear that with the aforementioned rise of matriarchy this state of affairs is changing. The predatory instinct of humanity is not confined to the male. However, the line of reasoning suggested is too vast to follow in the limits of a small volume, and I mention it merely that the student may think about it at his leisure as he peruses the forthcoming chapters.
The extraordinary development of prostitution in the nineteenth century prefaced the present phase with a last manifestation of the old social attitude. Relying upon the assumption that the male seduces the female, we are faced in this modern world with the undeniable fact that the ranks of the seduced—i.e., the unprotected young women of society—are also shifting and changing. The orderly arrangement which we have been led to expect is breaking up. In former times our women were divided into two main classes, or groups:
(a) Professionals (those who made a vocation of being seduced)[3]
(b) Amateurs (those to whom the process of being seduced was a side line).[4]
However in late years there has grown up among us a third class, designated as (c), The only familiar term which has yet been applied was coined by Doctor Ethel Waters, who invented for them the descriptive appellation “freebies” in recognition of their independent stand in the matter of economics and convention. These revolutionists have formulated a philosophy which draws upon those of both older classes for its sources. To be freebie, seduction is neither a means of livelihood, as in the case of class (a), nor inevitable disgrace, as it is with class (b).[5]
It is undoubtedly this school of thought that influenced the Missouri jurist who, after a long and tiresome case of seduction, in which he found for the defendant, made a pronouncement from the bench to the effect that “There is no such thing as seduction.”[6] Although in my opinion this statement is somewhat extreme for our purposes, it serves to demonstrate the modern trend of sentiment.[7]
The modern social attitude had its prototype in the days of Cleopatra, where, as every classical scholar knows, the women of the upper classes exhibited an amazing independence. In Rome and Alexandria “the professional courtesans were gloomily complaining that their business had been hard hit by the fact that the ladies of fashion asked no payment for exertions of a similar nature.”[8]
Taking these facts into consideration, we must admit that in the light of modern improvement a new definition is required: one more in line with present day practice. For the purpose of this treatise let it be understood therefore that _seduction is the process of persuading someone to do that which he or she has wanted to do all the time_.
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Footnote 1:
The Sexual Life of Savages. B. Malinowski.
Footnote 2:
Domestic Manners of the Americans. By Frances Trollope. New York; Dodd, Mead and Company, 1927.
Footnote 3:
Recreations of a Merchant, or the Christian Sketch Book. By William A. Brewer. Boston. See also Hatrack by Herbert Asbury, The American Mercury, April, 1926; and The Brass Check. By Upton Sinclair. Pasadena.
Footnote 4:
The Beautiful Victim: Being a Full Account of the Seduction and Sorrows of Miss Mary Kirkpatrick (National Police Gazette: 1862).
Footnote 5:
The Green Hat. By Michael Arlen.
Footnote 6:
Eddinger versus Thompson: Harris j.
Footnote 7:
For further exposition of juridical aspects of the subject see Die Zivilrechtlichen Ansprüche von Frauenspersonen aus aus-serehelichem Beischlafe: Hans Hochstein.
Footnote 8:
Personalities of Antiquity ... Arthur Weigall.
SEDUCTION IN HISTORY
The records preserved from older civilizations are (as has been said before) too fundamental in treatment to be of much value to us in the matter of details. We know, however, that the mythology and folklore of any race presents a more or less accurate idea of the customs of the time. Granting an amount of exaggeration in the fables, we have still the proof that seduction has always been a recognized practice in Heaven. Scarcely a god has not dabbled in the art at one time or another. In the first place they start off with the advantages of divinity and a working knowledge of black magic.[9] They could be called seducers in the true sense of the word only by courtesy. Jupiter, to take an example, used methods of archaic and brutal simplicity. To be sure, he would sometimes take the trouble to turn himself into a swan or a bull or a shower of gold, but such exercises are second nature to a deity and cause no delay or exhaustion. Ammon, the Egyptian god, associated exclusively with royalty, and no one thought of calling him to task for such moral irregularities. On the contrary, the kingly family was proud of him.[10]
A close study of the ancient Indians reveals the fact that they deemed seduction one of the most important of the arts, rivalling philosophy in popularity as a study.[11] The Chinese with their customary reserve, make no mention of such matters in official papers, but a quantity of poetry and maxims discloses a keen Oriental interest in the topic.[12] The Old Testament abounds in stories of seduction by means of trickery, bribery and simple persuasion. It is safe to assume from the records that seduction in all parts of the civilized world was at about the same stage of primary development.
The Middle Ages show some progress. Literature was growing into an important culture, and we have much more source material. There are manifestations of refinement in the ancient game, but at the same time the world was not as light-hearted about these matters as it had been in the past. The growth of the Church, with its set ideas of these subjects and its zeal to catalogue the sins of mankind and to deal out punishment accordingly, gave to seduction its greatest impetus. At no other time in history has such a vast amount of time and thought been expended on one idea. It became a sin, and therefore a necessity.
Added to the stimulation of the churchly attitude was that of the caste system, which made seduction the only means of communication between the classes. The Renaissance introduced a new fashion, persuasion by means of bribery. Kings and their courtiers led the movement by elevating their mistresses to dizzy heights of power and wealth. The sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries witnessed an influx of new families and the ascent of many a lowly maiden. Several of the noblest families of England trace their origin to such glittering seductions.[13] Indeed this process became at one time so notorious that it crept into folklore and has been preserved for us in many a ballad, of which the following is representative:
“She was poor but she was honest, Victim of the Squire’s whim.”
Even before this period, England had introduced a variation of the art in the form of Chivalry. This school of behaviour, while professing an ignorance of the very rudiments of seduction, nevertheless played an important part in its development, as is convincingly illustrated by the old song:
“In days of old, when knights were bold And barons held their sway, A warrior bold, with spurs of gold, Sang merrily his lay.”
But aside from the royal habits, there was no imagination, no finesse to seduction. It was a stereotyped affair, a furtive irregularity, a silly little sin. The seduction of the middle classes was a monotonous business, popular only by reason of the danger it entailed. It has remained for our modern world to raise it to a place of dignity among the leading interests of all society.
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Footnote 9:
Bulfinch’s Mythology.
Footnote 10:
The Golden Bough. Sir J. Frazer.
Footnote 11:
The Kama Sutra.
Footnote 12:
Colored Stars. E. Powys Mathers. Houghton Mifflin.
Footnote 13:
Cf. The Complete Peerage.
THIS MODERN WORLD
What are the reasons for this recent tendency? There are many answers. In the first place, mankind need no longer turn the whole of its energy to defence and sustenance. The life of the average man is not completely devoted to his business. He is a rarely active person if one-third of his day is given over to actual work.
“I work eight hours, I sleep eight hours, That leaves eight hours for love.” —_Popular ballad_
Otherwise what does he do with his time?
“What makes the business man tired? What does the business man do?” —_Popular song_
He reads, he plays, sometimes he wages war, and for the rest of the time he sleeps, eats and makes love. We find ourselves in a restless age, a time of experiment; when almost everyone is urged by the same desire to revise and improve.
It is the Golden Age of good living, consequently it is the age of impending boredom. In such an atmosphere we would expect to find a development of parlour pastimes. These conditions, this pleasant leisure, this much vaunted, generally diffused prosperity, this impatience for hallowed tradition and the time-honoured devices for improving one’s time, have given rise to crossword puzzles, introspection, and modern seduction.
DIFFICULTIES OF RESEARCH
Since the connotation of the word has been altered, I venture to assert that there have been converted to the practices of seduction at least twice as many devotees as had flourished before. This statement will undoubtedly be challenged: once more, I make no doubt, the skeptical will object to my conclusions on the grounds that a scientific recluse is of necessity withdrawn from the world and its customs and is thus automatically excluded as a responsible judge of sociological problems. It might be appropriate in this preface to enter a plea for our great body of research workers who are submitted to this sort of amateur criticism. The path of the scientist is beset with difficulties of every nature; not only those in the natural line of his work, but the wholesale hostility of the uninformed layman who does not understand the hardships and delays of laboratory procedure. In this case I hope to forestall criticism by claiming to have followed a conscientious program of newspaper reading. My statement is based on the knowledge common to the layman. I cite as proof the columns of the newspapers, both the items of fact and the syndicated columns which, it would appear, devote seventy-five per cent of their space to discussion of the present generation and what to do about it.
Indeed other students of society have gone farther, much farther. Dr. Henry W. Gardner, eminent social psychologist, seven years ago devoted his doctor’s thesis to the so-called conditions of morality then prevailing on the “campus.” With highly commendable enthusiasm, this scholar spent almost the entire school year in an alder bush that grew on the edge of a secluded path known to irreverent minds as Lover’s Lane, where the youths of the university were wont to take their evening strolls. He adduced the following significant statistics:
Of the 3,061 automobiles that drove through the lane in one week, 2,009 stopped, and 2,005 turned off the motors. Of these, 154 drove on again after periods of time varying to an upper limit of five minutes. Of the remainder, 1,788 parked for periods of not less than one hour and not more than two hours and three-quarters. Dr. Gardner ascribed the fixation of these limits to the period between the beginning of darkness (which of course varied with the season) and the “coeds’” curfew.
Of the remaining sixty-three, forty-nine of the automobiles spent the entire night in the lane. The fate of the other fourteen will never be known: they were all still there on the historic night when a watchman stumbled over Dr. Gardner’s feet and took him to jail before he could explain. The vicissitudes and obstacles that stand in the scientist’s way cannot be overestimated. This deplorable incident is merely one example of the prevalent attitude.
Another of his experiments was to fix a dictaphone beneath the old oak bench at the far end of Lover’s Lane. He did this shortly after the unfortunate episode of the jail, and for eleven nights he was thus enabled to sit at his ease in the laboratory, taking notes. (I myself have much reason to thank and commend Dr. Gardner’s foresight: these notes, while they have not been used as source material, have nevertheless allowed me to corroborate many of my own conclusions.)
METHOD OF TREATMENT
The method used in this treatise is the result of much thought. After attempting several other outlines, I have come to the conclusion that the most graphic representation is that of hypothetical cases for each lesson—i.e., each chapter represents a typical case, or synthetic experience. The student may at first glance object to this treatment, but a short survey will, I hope, convince him that the system is the only adequate one possible. Note that each experiment is couched in colloquial terms, the better to carry the atmosphere of the lesson. Of course the student is expected to vary the program according to his own requirements: these experiments are to serve merely as outlines. I have attempted to avoid as far as possible that wealth of technical terminology so dear to the heart of the average scientific author and so trying to the beginner: I have dared to hope that my compilation would be an aid not only to that small band who have dedicated their lives exclusively to research, but also to the great masses, the dilettantes and amateurs who might be able to find some inspiration in these pages.
The preparation, both research and field work, has been arduous, but what accomplishment was ever valuable without some labour and pains? If my contribution to scientific literature has in some small measure advanced the penetration of my fellow man and eased his path of loving, I am amply repaid.
In conclusion, I wish to thank those who have worked with me. Without their unfailing patience, sympathy and assiduity this little book could never have been written.
_New York_. _Thanksgiving, 1929._ E. H.
EXPERIMENTS
WHAT IS SEDUCTION?
THIS MODERN WORLD
CHAPTER
1. I THINK YOU HAVE A GREAT CAPACITY FOR LIVING
2. JUST ANOTHER LITTLE ONE
3. FEEL MY MUSCLE
4. YOU’RE NOT THE DOMESTIC TYPE
5. I’M BAD
6. AN UGLY OLD THING LIKE ME
7. BE INDEPENDENT!
8. WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR HUSBAND’S DOING?
9. MUSIC GETS ME
10. EVERYBODY DOES
11. THIS BUSINESS
12. GAME LITTLE KID
13. PROMISE ME YOU WON’T
14. AH, WHAT IS LIFE?
15. A MAN MY AGE
16. GONNA BE NICE?
17. LIFE IS SHORT
18. I’D HAVE SAID YOU WERE FROM NEW YORK
19. SHE LOVED ME FOR THE DANGERS
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. I THINK YOU HAVE A GREAT CAPACITY FOR LIVING
_TYPE:_
Well-to-do man with slightly artistic tendencies; the sort that believes first in money, then in full enjoyment of it. His philosophy is practical but not too limited to material considerations; in other words, he talks well on almost any subject.
_SUBJECT:_
Slightly younger, but of the same breed. The families of the two protagonists have probably been friendly for two generations.
_APPARATUS:_
A restaurant: one of the more leisurely ones where the dishes do not rattle but an orchestra makes conversation just as difficult.
_REMARKS:_
The keynote of the approach is a tacit appreciation of intelligence on the part of the subject. This sympathetic attitude is very important. Think it all over carefully, put a flower in your buttonhole and go ahead.
I THINK YOU HAVE A GREAT CAPACITY FOR LIVING
You have reached the coffee and are putting up a brave fight against the orchestra before going out into the privacy of the street.
_She:_ And we didn’t get home, after all, until two o’clock. I was so angry: it spoiled the evening.
_You:_ Angry! I don’t think that you could ever be angry.
_She:_ Oh, yes, you don’t know me at all. I have a _dreadful_ temper.
_You:_ Well, it doesn’t somehow fit in with my idea of you, you see. No, I must disagree with you. You haven’t a temper. It’s impossible for you to have a really earthly emotion.
_She (somewhat irritated):_ Why, how can you say such a thing?
_You:_ You’re a strangely aloof child, you know.
_She (after a pleased little silence):_ That’s not nice of you.
_You:_ Why not? It’s so nice of you, you know.
_She:_ Oh, do you really think so? I’m sure I don’t try to be. No.... (_with a charming smile_)—you’re quite wrong. It’s the rest of them that are different. I’m really very normal.
_You:_ Normal? Oh, my dear! And yet, after all, it’s not very funny. Perhaps it’s a tragedy.
_She:_ What is?
_You:_ Your attitude toward life.
_She:_ Why, I have no attitude!
_You:_ There you are; that’s just it. Someone of us mortals tries to tell you how we—how flesh-and-blood beings react to you, and you simply open those clear eyes of yours, and—well, how can I go on talking in the face of such bland ignorance?
_She:_ Ignorance! Why I don’t....
_You:_ Oh, surely you know how ignorant you are? You must remain ignorant with deliberation. It’s part of your charm, of course, but ... oh, how charming you could be, in another way!
_She:_ Really.... (_suddenly her voice warms and she leans a little over the table, talking eagerly_) No, you’re perfectly right. I mean from your viewpoint, of course. One thing that you forget, though, is that I don’t feel the way that you and the rest of them do. I can’t really understand it myself, and yet ... oh, all that sort of thing; emotion and all that; seems so ... so messy.
_You:_ Messy? My dear child, what sort of people can you have known?
_She:_ Perfectly normal people, I assure you. No, it’s my own fault. It’s me, and I can’t help it. Emotion to me has always seemed—no thank you, just demi-tasse—seemed common. Not aristocratic. That’s rather a snide thing to say, isn’t it? I don’t mean to sound that way.
_You:_ I know you don’t. (_The music plays without competition for a moment_). But how sad!
_She:_ Sad? Oh no. I get along quite well. I’m really very happy, except once in a while. I’m as happy, that is, as you can possibly be for all your—your normality.
_You:_ But what a strange way for an intelligent person like yourself to think! Have you no curiosity?
_She:_ Oh, certainly. To an extent. But when curiosity conflicts with one’s disgusts....
_You:_ Disgusts? Now you are certainly wrong. It gives you away.
_She:_ Yes, that was a silly thing to say.
_You:_ Don’t you think that you allow your mind to rule you too much? It’s really dangerous. I mean it. Surely your intelligence tells you that a well-rounded personality....
_She:_ But I told you; I don’t want to experiment!
_You:_ I can’t believe that you are in a position to judge. You don’t really know what you want; you don’t know what to want. I don’t believe you for a minute when you say you are happy. Lovely, yes; but lovely in a melancholy way. How can you know about yourself, you wise child? Tell me, are you always so serene?
_She:_ You’re getting much too serious. Let’s dance.