Ten years ago a novel by the British Erika Leonard Mitchell (EL James) reached bookstores almost everywhere in the world to revolutionize erotic literature . We are talking about Fifty Shades of Grey .
With her began a saga made up of five novels: the aforementioned 50 Shades of Grey , Fifty Shades Darker , 50 Shades Freed , Gray and, finally, Freed .
This is, in principle, the last novel in the saga, published recently. It delves into the personality of the central character of Christian Gray.
the gray phenomenon
To speak of this fictional saga is to speak of a worldwide publishing and sociological phenomenon. Translated into 50 languages, it is enough to look at the sales figures for the different parts of the series to get an idea of how far this phenomenon has crossed borders since the publication of the first novel. 165 million copies, no more and no less, have sold EL James worldwide!
The film adaptations that have been made so far, centered on the first three novels in the series, have undoubtedly helped achieve that exorbitant sales figure. Popularly known as the Fifty Shades of Gray Trilogy , these three works served as the basis for first Sam Taylor-Johnson and then James Foley to direct three films that, together with James's narrative work, have converted the term BDSM , until not long ago, typical of a very specific minority, in a fashionable word throughout the world.
The story, set in Seattle, begins when literature student Anastasia Steele (played by American actress Dakota Johnson ) is commissioned to interview a young and successful businessman. That young businessman is Christian Gray (played by Jamie Dornan ). Attractive and seductive, Anastasia falls in love with him.
The erotic spark between the two is immediate. He is a tormented man who must control everything. She, an independent and serene girl. The beginning of erotic relationships will serve Anastasia to discover a new type of sexual practice. The most refined Bondage is one of Christian's hobbies. She, little by little, will discover how far her most intimate desires reach.
BDSM in the Fifty Shades of Gray saga
Without wishing to spoil the plot of this literary and cinematographic saga, we will point out that the success of the printed book of this erotic novel is fundamentally based on an excellent combination of a romantic story and a high-voltage erotic game that has served to "bring out from the closet" a whole range of alternative sexual practices.
Literary criticism and also the author herself have pointed out that the fact that the sexual scenes are narrated with elegance and without falling into vulgarity at any time has greatly helped women in general to connect more intimately with what they feel. account in the different novels. After all, what the different works of the saga are about is a very passionate love story. The series is thus a great romantic story.
Despite the fact that the most authentic lovers of BDSM look at each other with a great critical distance and a little over their shoulders at everything that appears in EL James's novels, the truth is that what is told in them has served to increase the number of people interested in sadomaso , discipline, domination/submission or erotic role-playing has increased markedly throughout the world.
In that sense, if this series of novels is useful for anything, it is to show that, in most cases, in BDSM sex, the psychological and the playful are as important as the instruments and accessories that can be used in the different practices. And it is that, while the use of handcuffs, whips and ties of various types is important, it is not less the imaginative capacity that one has when using them and the way of seeking the limits of one's own desire.
And it is in this last sense, in that of being a magnificent invitation to experimentation, in which we find the maximum value of these novels. In the same way that Anastasia Steele embarks on a path of self-knowledge by relating to Christian, the reader of the saga is also pushed, in one way or another, to seek new limits to their sexuality, new sensitive and erotic experiences. And that, deep down, is still an excellent way to enrich one's own life.
