The Macquarie dictionary (1997, p. 720 & p. 1668) clearly delineates between erotica and pornography, with the former referring to “literature or art dealing with sexual love” and the latter defined as “obscene literature, art, or photography, designed to excite sexual desire”. Further separation is evident when one adds the definition given by that same lexicon of Australian English for obscene, that is, “offensive to modesty or decency; indecent; inciting to lust or sexual depravity; lewd” (The Macquarie dictionary 1997, p. 1487). From these definitions, it could be concluded erotica might involve emotion, trust, caring and consideration, whereas pornography may be blatantly physical, deprived of passion, perhaps even immoral. But is such a dry dictionary distinction between these two terms legitimate or even practical? Is it possible, given, as Lopez and George (1995, p. 275) claim, pornography and erotica “are often used as interchangeable terms”, there are cultural values that might inform, or conversely, subvert, such a distinction? D. H. Lawrence (Sanders 1998, p. 1) argues “What is pornography to one man is the laughter of genius to another”. Sanders (1998, p. 1) ventures to extrapolate on Lawrence’s deliberation, claiming “what is erotica to one man or woman is the agony of boredom to another”. A consideration of Delta of Venus, a collection of short stories by Anaïs Nin, written in the 1940s for an anonymous client who demanded she “leave out the poetry and descriptions of anything but sex”, lends credence to those afore cited assertions of Lawrence, Sanders, Lopez and George (Nin 2000, p. xiii). Just as beauty may be claimed to be in the eye of the beholder, a determination of a text as either erotic or pornographic may similarly be in the mind and heart – and loins – of the spectator.

The back cover of the 2000 Penguin Classics publication of Nin’s Delta of Venus claims:

Her vibrant and impassioned prose evokes the essence of female sexuality in a world where only love has meaning (Nin 2000).

While there may be some arguable validity to that statement, bearing in mind its purpose as a sales pitch, one has to question what meaning ‘love’ has, and indeed, what is considered as ‘the essence of female sexuality’. Though the stories in this collection do possess a certain feminine lyricism, invariably the plot of each passage tends to revolve around the male phallus and its satisfaction, whether that be by the labia of a mature Brazilian dancer, the thighs of pre-pubescent girls, or the rectum of a blonde, boarding school boy. It would seem, to this critic at least, the intention or determination, even confidence of each tract is the ejaculation of the essence of male sexuality. This is not necessarily an adversarial critique of Nin’s writing, though it may run counter to commentary by others, such as Rothstein (Eby n.d., p. 2), who would consider Delta of Venus as “classic female erotica”. One must, in assessing the text, make allowance for her target audience. These words were not initially intended for public dissemination, but rather, as previously stated, were destined for the eyes of a sole male reader, a customer who demanded not lyricism, but merely the depiction of, presumably from the end result, phallocentric sex. But such an admittedly potentially contentious and oppositional reading of this particular example of Nin’s work, given her wide critical acclaim as an author of so-called erotica, does bring to attention the divergent interpretations possible of any work, be it literary, visual or otherwise, that involves depictions, or contrives imaginings, of anything as personal as sex or sexuality.

Even Nin herself (Nin 2000, p. x) confuses the distinction between erotica and pornography, using both terms in a single diary entry to describe her writings for the client. But just as Nin’s work may be read either as lyrical eroticism, pornographic titillation or even trite lewdness, as a text that offers different connotations for different readers, the terms erotica and pornography have, as Lopez and George (1995, p. 275) propose, “acquired connotative shadings” with pornography tending toward the negative and erotica conveying a “positively valenced aesthetic tone”. Dworkin and MacKinnon (Dolan 1987, p. 157) define pornography as “the graphic sexually explicit subordination of women”. But where does this place Nin’s text with her character of the Hungarian adventurer whose adventures basically involve a form of sexual colonisation; or throughout the entire collection, the tales of one woman after another succumbing to the erect penis, invariably “big, firm as a polished wood baton” (Nin 2000, p. 30). Perhaps Nin is able to legitimise her work as erotica by asserting, as Felber (1995, p. 309) points out, that she is “intuitively using a woman’s language, seeing sexual experience from a woman’s point of view” (Nin 2000, p. xiii). Where Spencer (Felber 1995, p. 316) would consider Nin’s prose as “a lyrical and “flowing” language centred on women’s … experiences”, Sanders (1998, p. 3) would call it “flaccid prose … rehashing sexual stereotypes”. Admittedly, Sanders is actually referring there to White Stains (Nin 1998), another collection of stories written by Nin and others, but those texts as well were “churned out for a dollar a page” (Sanders 1998, p. 3). Nin, it would seem, made a living from writing stories aimed at achieving the sexual excitement of, not readers, but clients. If this be the case, one would have to label Delta of Venus as pornographic, being, by Hyde’s definition of pornography, “material … [with] … the power to excite sexual passions” (Diamond 1980, p. 687).

But wait, lest one rush to any climactic conclusions. “The line”, as Provisions Library (n.d.) avers, “between pornography and erotica … is not … [so] … easily drawn”. While Miller (2002, p. 1) might agree with Hyde that pornography “has sexual arousal as its primary objective”, it is also about “control”. There are others, in particular, feminists, or proponents of feminist theory, who would argue, as Diamond (1980, p. 689) claims, that pornography is not actually about “sex but power and violence”. A most powerful and violent means of control is rape, and, as Dworkin (Barnard 1998) argues, “if rape is the practice then pornography is the theory”. It would be difficult to accuse Nin of having conspired to produce material in order to incite rape. Perhaps there is a need for an additional category, as Guber (1987, p. 739) suggests, of “pornartgraphy”, pornography with pretensions to an artistic aesthetic. But then, what is art? Not everyone appreciates, for example, the art of Robert Mapplethorpe.

It may be safer to accept the claim by Preston (Miller 2002, p. 1) that there is no difference between erotica and pornography; that erotica is merely “the stuff bought by rich people”. An even safer conclusion might be to adopt what Guber (1987, p. 714) claims to be the libertarian feminist perspective: “What turns me on is erotic; what turns you on is pornographic”. Either way, it is a distinction which, as with art, can only be determined by the addressee, whose reading of any text will be dependent on that individual’s cultural values. To borrow from the title of Sanders’ review (1998), “one’s hot, the other’s not”. It really just depends on taste: should one choose the macaroni cheese or the Tandoori curry? Both meals serve the same purpose, achieve the same ends. One’s just a little bit spicier than the other.

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