In a society where sex is consistently consumed in our daily media, its hard to conceptualize a time period when sex was a taboo conversation spoken only behind closed doors. From the late 800s until the mid-900s, sexual promiscuity was a subject not often spoken aloud. It was considered dirty and perverse to speak of such things, yet, authors, playwrights, and artists continued to use their works to portray sexuality in their own ways. Down south, in the heart of Louisiana, New Orleans was in the midst of creating its own reputation as a city that thrived on sexual transgressions. From the nineteenth century going into the twentieth century, New Orleans solidified their reputation with the combination of sexual promiscuity and interracial relations. From the creation of Storyville, a district of the New Orleans French Quarter that thrived on the containment of prostitution, to the New Orleans we know today, sexual desires have never been pushed into the shadows. Famous authors and playwrights came out of the city with their works highlighting on the debauchery of the city. While sexual liberations were often seen as positives, they could also lead to harmful effects. This ideology is also portrayed in literary formats. For example, Tennessee Williams, a famous 900s playwright, writes A Streetcar Named Desire explaining the mental break of Blanche DuBois as a result of her sexual desire being detrimental to her mental stability, along with oth
er outstanding circumstances. Similar to Tennessee Williams in his literary themes, Kate Chopin, author of the famous book The Awakening uses her literary voice to bring Edna Pontellier to life. Chopin writes about Ednas life as she wills to become an autonomous woman without the constraint of societys expectations. This story centers itself around the themes of self-discovery through Ednas sexual liberation, correlating with her eventual death. Continuing, Lyle Saxon, a famous New Orleans author writes A Centaur Plays Croquet using symbolic messages to explain sex in a sexually repressed society. This paganistic story is centered around the theme of desire, similar to the other works mentioned. Adas desire is prevalent from the beginning, nearly identical to Blanches desire in A Streetcar Named Desire. Based on analyzing the works mentioned, it can be hypothesized that sexual transgressions can be detrimental to the emotional psyche of female protagonists in late 800s to mid-900s literature. In order to come to these conclusions, Kate Millets Sexual Politics will help give insight to certain female characters behaviors and how their characteristics help perpetuate the ideology that internalizing sexual desires is the causation for their mental instability. Through these works, the female protagonists continuously battle the patronizing patriarchal forces and as a result, this overwhelming notion breaks them down to their most vulnerable forms.