num_pages: 150
description: The Impenetrable Madam X is a naughty, comic romp through the fields of desire and pleasure in 19th century Spain. With tongue in cheek, Gambaro concocts hilariously exaggerated scenes of sexual acrobatics, poking fun at virile prowess, aging femininity, heterosexual hypocrisy and homosexual taboos.In this work, Gambaro shuns the well-trodden path to domination and pain for the sometimes frustrating one of erotic union and pleasure. Latent desires are not played out in victimizations of women by men but in a "battle without blood," where the contenders alternate as victors without cruelty and as vanquished without humiliation. Furthermore, Gambaro explores the sensuously boundless space of woman's desire and pleasure, while poking fun at phallocentric sexuality that tends to dominate not only in erotic literature but also in traditional psychoanalytic theories of Western culture as well.
language: English
title: The Impenetrable Madam X
titlecomplete: The Impenetrable Madam X (Latin American Literature and Culture)
ratings_count: 6
publisher: Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1991