The Art of Seduction (4 page)

power is irresistible, and nothing will bring you more power in the modern world than the ability to seduce. Repressing the desire to seduce is a kind of
xxii
•
Preface

The first thing to get in

hysterical reaction, revealing your deep-down fascination with the process;
your head is that every

you are only making your desires stronger. Some day they will come to the
single
\
Girl can be

surface.

caught
—a
nd that you'll

catch her if \ You set your

To have such power does not require a total transformation in your

toils right. Birds will

character or any kind of physical improvement in your looks. Seduction is a
sooner fall dumb in \

game of psychology, not beauty, and it is within the grasp of any person to
Springtime, \ Cicadas in

summer, or a hunting-dog \

become a master at the game. All that is required is that you look at the
Turn his back on a hare,

world differently, through the eyes of a seducer.

than a lover's bland

A seducer does not turn the power off and on—every social and per
inducements \ Can fail
sonal interaction is seen as a potential seduction. There is never a moment
with a woman, Even one

you suppose \ Reluctant

to waste. This is so for several reasons. The power seducers have over a man
will want it.

or woman works in social environments because they have learned how to

—OVID,
THE ART OF LOVE,

tone down the sexual element without getting rid of it. We may think we

see through them, but they are so pleasant to be around anyway that it does not matter. Trying to divide your life into moments in which you seduce and others in which you hold back will only confuse and constrain you.
The combination of these

Erotic desire and love lurk beneath the surface of almost every human en
two elements, enchantment
and surrender, is, then,

counter; better to give free rein to your skills than to try to use them only
essential to the love which

in the bedroom. (In fact, the seducer sees the world as his or her bedroom.)
we are discussing. . . .

This attitude creates great seductive momentum, and with each seduction
What exists in love is

you gain experience and practice. One social or sexual seduction makes the
surrender due to

enchantment.

next one easier, your confidence growing and making you more alluring.

—JOSÉ ORTEGA Y GASSET,
ON

People are drawn to you in greater numbers as the seducer's aura descends LOVE, TRANSLATED BY TOBY

upon you.

Seducers have a warrior's outlook on life. They see each person as a kind of walled castle to which they are laying siege. Seduction is a process of penetration: initially penetrating the target's mind, their first point of
What is good?
—
All that

defense. Once seducers have penetrated the mind, making the target fanta
heightens the feeling of
power, the will to power,

size about them, it is easy to lower resistance and create physical surrender.
power itself in man.
•

Seducers do not improvise; they do not leave this process to chance. Like
What is b a d ? — A l l that

any good general, they plan and strategize, aiming at the target's particular
proceeds from weakness.
•

weaknesses.

What is happiness?
—
The

feeling that power

The main obstacle to becoming a seducer is this foolish prejudice we
increases
—
that a resistance

have of seeing love and romance as some kind of sacred, magical realm
is overcome.

where things just fall into place, if they are meant to. This might seem ro— F R I E D R I C H NIETZSCHE,
THE

mantic and quaint, but it is really just a cover for our laziness. What will se
ANTI—CHRIST,
TRANSLATED BY

R. J. HOLLINGDALE

duce a person is the effort we expend on their behalf, showing how much we care, how much they are worth. Leaving things to chance is a recipe for disaster, and reveals that we do not take love and romance very seriously. It was the effort Casanova expended, the artfulness he applied to each affair that made him so devilishly seductive. Falling in love is a matter not of magic but of psychology. Once you understand your target's psychology, and strategize to suit it, you will be better able to cast a "magical" spell. A seducer sees love not as sacred but as warfare, where all is fair.

Seducers are never self-absorbed. Their gaze is directed outward, not inward. When they meet someone their first move is to get inside that per-
Preface
•
xxiii
son's skin, to see the world through their eyes. The reasons for this are sev-
The disaffection, neurosis,
eral. First, self-absorption is a sign of insecurity; it is anti-seductive. Every-
anguish and frustration
encountered by

one has insecurities, but seducers manage to ignore them, finding therapy
psychoanalysis comes no
for moments of self-doubt by being absorbed in the world. This gives them
doubt from being unable to
a buoyant spirit—we want to be around them. Second, getting into some-
love or to be loved, from
being unable to give or take

one's skin, imagining what it is like to be them, helps the seducer gather
pleasure, but the radical
valuable information, learn what makes that person tick, what will make
disenchantment comes from
them lose their ability to think straight and fall into a trap. Armed with
seduction and its failure.
Only those who lie

such information, they can provide focused and individualized attention—a
completely outside
rare commodity in a world in which most people see us only from behind
seduction are ill, even if
the screen of their own prejudices. Getting into the targets' skin is the first
they remain fully capable of
important tactical move in the war of penetration.

loving and making love.

Psychoanalysis believes it

Seducers see themselves as providers of pleasure, like bees that gather
treats the disorder of sex
pollen from some flowers and deliver it to others. As children we mostly
and desire, but in reality it
devoted our lives to play and pleasure. Adults often have feelings of being
is dealing with the
disorders of seduction. . . .

cut off from this paradise, of being weighed down by responsibilities. The
The most serious
seducer knows that people are waiting for pleasure—they never get enough
deficiencies always concern
of it from friends and lovers, and they cannot get it by themselves. A person
charm and not pleasure,
enchantment and not some

who enters their lives offering adventure and romance cannot be resisted.
vital or sexual satisfaction.
Pleasure is a feeling of being taken past our limits, of being overwhelmed— —JEAN BAUDRILLARD, by another person, by an experience. People are dying to be overwhelmed,
SEDUCTION

to let go of their usual stubbornness. Sometimes their resistance to us is a way of saying, Please seduce me. Seducers know that the possibility of pleasure will make a person follow them, and the experience of it will
Whatever is done from love
make someone open up, weak to the touch. They also train themselves to
always occurs beyond good
be sensitive to pleasure, knowing that feeling pleasure themselves will make
and evil.
it that much easier for them to infect the people around them.

— F R I E D R I C H NIETZSCHE,

BEYOND GOOD AND EVIL,

A seducer sees all of life as theater, everyone an actor. Most people feel TRANSLATED BY WALTER

they have constricted roles in life, which makes them unhappy. Seducers, KAUFMANN

on the other hand, can be anyone and can assume many roles. (The archetype here is the god Zeus, insatiable seducer of young maidens, whose main weapon was the ability to assume the form of whatever person or animal would most appeal to his victim.) Seducers take pleasure in performing and are not weighed down by their identity, or by some need to be themselves, or to be natural. This freedom of theirs, this fluidity in body and spirit, is what makes them attractive. What people lack in life is not more reality but illusion, fantasy, play. The clothes that seducers wear, the places they take you to, their words and actions, are slightly heightened—not overly theatrical but with a delightful edge of unreality, as if the two of you were living out a piece of fiction or were characters in a film. Seduction is a kind of theater in real life, the meeting of illusion and reality. Finally, seducers are completely amoral in their approach to life. It is all a game, an arena for play. Knowing that the moralists, the crabbed repressed types who croak about the evils of the seducer, secretly envy their power, they do not concern themselves with other people's opinions. They do not deal in moral judgments—nothing could be less seductive. Everything is
xxiv
•
Preface

Should anyone here in

pliant, fluid, like life itself. Seduction is a form of deception, but people
Rome lack finesse at love-

want to be led astray, they yearn to be seduced. If they didn't, seducers
making, \ Let him \ Try

would not find so many willing victims. Get rid of any moralizing tenden
me
—
read my book, and
results are guaranteed! \

cies, adopt the seducer's playful philosophy, and you will find the rest of the
Technique is the secret.

process easy and natural.

Charioteer, sailor,

oarsman, \ All need it.

Technique can control \

The Art of Seduction
is designed to arm you with weapons of persuasion and
Love himself.

charm, so that those around you will slowly lose their ability to resist with— O V I D ,
THE ART OF LOVE,
out knowing how or why it has happened. It is an art of war for delicate

times.

Every seduction has two elements that you must analyze and understand: first, yourself and what is seductive about you; and second, your target and the actions that will penetrate their defenses and create surrender. The two sides are equally important. If you strategize without paying attention to the parts of your character that draw people to you, you will be seen as a mechanical seducer, slimy and manipulative. If you rely on your seductive personality without paying attention to the other person, you will make terrible mistakes and limit your potential.

Consequently,
The Art of Seduction
is divided into two parts. The first half, "The Seductive Character," describes the nine types of seducer, plus the Anti-Seducer. Studying these types will make you aware of what is inherently seductive in your character, the basic building block of any seduction. The second half, "The Seductive Process," includes the twentyfour maneuvers and strategies that will instruct you on how to create a spell, break down people's resistance, give movement and force to your seduction, and induce surrender in your target. As a kind of bridge between the two parts, there is a chapter on the eighteen types of victims of a seduction—each of them missing something from their lives, each cradling an emptiness you can fill. Knowing what type you are dealing with will help you put into practice the ideas in both sections. Ignore any part of this book and you will be an incomplete seducer.

The ideas and strategies in
The Art of Seduction
are based on the writings and historical accounts of the most successful seducers in history. The sources include the seducers' own memoirs (by Casanova, Errol Flynn, Natalie Barney, Marilyn Monroe); biographies (of Cleopatra, Josephine Bonaparte, John F. Kennedy, Duke Ellington); handbooks on the subject (most notably Ovid's
Art of Love);
and fictional accounts of seductions (Choderlos de Laclos's
Dangerous Liaisons,
Søren Kierkegaard's
The Seducer's Diary,
Murasaki Shikibu's
The Tale of Genji).
The heroes and heroines of these literary works are generally modeled on real-life seducers. The strategies they employ reveal the intimate connection between fiction and seduction, creating illusion and leading a person along. In putting the book's lessons into practice, you will be following in the path of the greatest masters of the art. Finally, the spirit that will make you a consummate seducer is the spirit in which you should read this book. The French writer Denis Diderot once wrote, "I give my mind the liberty to follow the first wise or foolish
Preface • xxv

idea that presents itself, just as in the avenue de Foy our dissolute youths follow close on the heels of some strumpet, then leave her to pursue another, attacking all of them and attaching themselves to none. My thoughts are my strumpets." He meant that he let himself be seduced by ideas, following whichever one caught his fancy until a better one came along, his thoughts infused with a kind of sexual excitement. Once you enter these pages, do as Diderot advised: let yourself be lured by the stories and ideas, your mind open and your thoughts fluid. Slowly you will find yourself absorbing the poison through the skin and you will begin to see everything as a seduction, including the way you think and how you look at the world.
Most virtue is a demand for greater seduction.

—NATALIE BARNEY

We all have the power of attraction—the ability to draw people in and hold them in our thrall. Far from all of us, though, are aware of this inner potential, and we imagine attractiveness instead as a near-mystical trait that a select few are born with and the rest will never command. Yet all we need to do to realize our potential is understand what it is in a person's character that naturally excites people and develop these latent qualities within us.

Successful seductions rarely begin with an obvious maneuver or strategic device. That is certain to arouse suspicion. Successful seductions begin with your character, your ability to radiate some quality that attracts people and stirs their emotions in a way that is beyond their control. Hypnotized by your seductive character, your victims will not notice your subsequent manipulations. It will then be child's play to mislead and seduce them. There are nine seducer types in the world. Each type has a particular character trait that comes from deep within and creates a seductive pull.
Sirens
have an abundance of sexual energy and know how to use it.
Rakes
insatiably adore the opposite sex, and their desire is infectious.
Ideal Lovers
have an aesthetic sensibility that they apply to romance.
Dandies
like to play with their image, creating a striking and androgynous allure.
Naturals
are spontaneous and open.
Coquettes
are self-sufficient, with a fascinating cool at their core.
Charmers
want and know how to please—they are social creatures.
Charismatics
have an unusual confidence in themselves.
Stars
are ethereal and envelop themselves in mystery. The chapters in this section will take you inside each of the nine types. At least one of the chapters should strike a chord—you will recognize part of yourself. That chapter will be the key to developing your own powers of attraction. Let us say you have coquettish tendencies. The Coquette chapter will show you how to build upon your own self-sufficiency, alternating heat and coldness to ensnare your victims. It will show you how to take your natural qualities further, becoming a grand Coquette, the type we fight over. There is no point in being timid with a seductive quality. We are charmed by an unabashed Rake and excuse his excesses, but a halfhearted Rake gets no respect. Once you have cultivated your dominant character trait, adding some art to what nature has given you, you can then develop a second or third trait, adding depth and mystery to your persona. Finally the section's tenth chapter, on the
Anti-Seducer,
will make you aware of the op
3

4 • The Art of Seduction

posite potential within you—the power of repulsion. At all cost you must root out any anti-seductive tendencies you may have.

Think of the nine types as shadows, silhouettes. Only by stepping into one of them and letting it grow inside you can you begin to develop the seductive character that will bring you limitless power.

A

man is often

secretly oppressed by

the role he has to

play
—
by always having to

be responsible, in control, and

rational. The Siren is the ulti-

mate male fantasy figure because

she offers a total release from the

limitations of his life. In her pres-

ence, which is always heightened and

sexually charged, the male feels

transported to a world of pure plea-

sure. She is dangerous, and in pursu-

ing her energetically the man can lose

control over himself something he

yearns to do. The Siren is a mirage;

she lures men by cultivating a par-

ticular appearance and manner.

In a world where women are

often too timid to project such

an image, learn to take

control of the male li-

bido by embodying

his fantasy.

The Spectacular Siren

In the year 48 B.C., Ptolemy XIV of Egypt managed to depose and exile his sister and wife, Queen Cleopatra. He secured the country's borders against her return and began to rule on his own. Later that year, Julius Caesar came to Alexandria to ensure that despite the local power struggles, Egypt would remain loyal to Rome.

One night Caesar was meeting with his generals in the Egyptian palace,
In the mean time our good
discussing strategy, when a guard entered to report that a Greek merchant
ship, with that perfect wind
was at the door bearing a large and valuable gift for the Roman leader.
to drive her, fast
approached the Sirens' Isle.

Caesar, in the mood for a little fun, gave the merchant permission to enter.
But now the breeze
The man came in, carrying on his shoulders a large rolled-up carpet. He
dropped, some power lulled
undid the rope around the bundle and with a snap of his wrists unfurled
the waves, and a breathless
calm set in. Rising from

it—revealing the young Cleopatra, who had been hidden inside, and who
their seats my men drew
rose up half clothed before Caesar and his guests, like Venus emerging from
in the sail and threw it into
the waves.

the hold, then sat down

at the oars and churned the

Everyone was dazzled at the sight of the beautiful young queen (only
water white with their
twenty-one at the time) appearing before them suddenly as if in a dream.
blades of polished pine.
They were astounded at her daring and theatricality—smuggled into the
Meanwhile I took a large
harbor at night with only one man to protect her, risking everything on a
round of wax, cut it up
small with my sword, and

bold move. No one was more enchanted than Caesar. According to the
kneaded the pieces with all
Roman writer Dio Cassius, "Cleopatra was in the prime of life. She had a
the strength of my fingers.
delightful voice which could not fail to cast a spell over all who heard it.
The wax soon yielded to
my vigorous treatment and

Such was the charm of her person and her speech that they drew the cold-
grew warm, for I had the
est and most determined misogynist into her toils. Caesar was spellbound as
rays of my Lord the Sun to
soon as he set eyes on her and she opened her mouth to speak." That same
help me. I took each of my
men in turn and plugged

evening Cleopatra became Caesar s lover.

their ears with it. They

Caesar had had numerous mistresses before, to divert him from the rig-
then made me a prisoner
ors of his campaigns. But he had always disposed of them quickly to return
on my ship by binding me
hand and foot, standing

to what really thrilled him—political intrigue, the challenges of warfare,
me up by the step of the
the Roman theater. Caesar had seen women try anything to keep him un-
mast and tying the rope's
der their spell. Yet nothing prepared him for Cleopatra. One night she
ends to the mast itself.
would tell him how together they could revive the glory of Alexander the
This done, they sat down
once more and struck the

Great, and rule the world like gods. The next she would entertain him
grey water with their oars.
dressed as the goddess Isis, surrounded by the opulence of her court. •
We made good progress
Cleopatra initiated Caesar in the most decadent revelries, presenting herself
and had just come within
call of the shore when the