I'll Teach You How to Fuck

When Madonna's book Sex was announced, you had the option to pre-order it from the local bookstore three months in advance. It had a heavy metallic book cover and was wrapped in a shiny silver wrapper with her face adorning the front. Inside was a complimentary CD of her tune Erotic and a small comic of photos with her and Rosie O'Donnell and Naomi Campbell inside. Quite a package! The HMV music store in New York had a release party of the book where you could go into the store and view the book for $1/minute. When the public libraries starting stocking the book, you were only allowed to check it out for an hour at a time. It couldn't leave the library premises. The book is currently out of print.

The book is narrated by Dita, named after the silent film actress, Dita Parlo. Some of the imagery inside is absolutely beautiful; some of it completely disturbing. Warner Bros. was completely opposed to the idea of the production of the book and had her sign a legal agreement, stating that she was not to include religious ornamentation or acts of bestiality in the book. Madonna actually broke these rules by including a nude photo of herself with a dog and an image with a crucifix in the background.

Madonna said that she was completely nervous about the project beforehand and she went through months of working out in order to prepare for the nude photographs that were taken of her.

Of course, when a book of this nature comes out, there is always the predictable "shock and horror" by those who are more conventional in their approach to living that feel threatened by it. This all played out as knee-jerk responses normally do, with media outlets feeling the need to get everyone to comment on it. The book sold 150,000 copies the day it was released.

It seems that most straight men dislike Madonna. Perhaps it's because of her inability to compromise her business, her music or her art in order to accomodate another person's whim or idea of who she is or how she should "market herself." Most likely, this is the reason she was so adamant in making sure that everything went as SHE wanted it to when producing this book. Sex is the one arena where women feel the least power and so for Madonna to assert herself in this realm was of utmost importance.




You can view the entire book online.

Here's the CD that accompanied the book.