ever again register above lukewarm.” Hasnshe learned anything except “that mynsensation thermostat has been thrownnout of whack”? Not that I can see.nMcNeill’s inability to see the implicationsnof her affair, her complicity, is the mostnhorrifying aspect of her story.nIhe Irish novelist Edna O’Briennfails badly with I Hardly Knew You,nwhich probably never would have seennthe light of day, had it been submitted bynan unknown. In the past, O’Brien’s novelsnand short stories have focused on whatnshe called “The Love Object,” in one ofnher short stories. Almost always set innthe bedroom, O’Brien’s theme usually isnthe adulterous passion of a young womannfor an older man. Never able to extendntheir emotional base beyond the bedroom’snfour walls, O’Brien’s women arenenlarged by, tortured by, stultified by,nabandoned by the object of their passions.nToo-consciously erotic, her works seemnunconsciously didactic, as they limn thenextramarital minuet: titillating curiosity,nconsummation, female adoration addingnup to a gratified—and quickly bored—nmale indifference.nIn O’Brien’s new novel, an oldernwoman has an affair with a man half hernage (in this country, half one’s age plusnone year is the male convention, althoughnwhy such behavior is acceptable for mennis beyond my ken). The young man hasnan epileptic seizure in bed, and his mistressnmurders him. This murderous violencenas a response to an illness whosengreatest complication is social discrimination,nis sickening—particularly from anwriter supposedly known for her “sensitivity.”nThe O’Brien bedroom walls havenclosed in, like some trap in MissionnImpossible. Only reader revulsion is left,nand the nagging sense that O’Brien isnlong overdue for a move beyond hernclaustrophobic bedroom prison.nO’Brien’s and McNeill’s books bothnfocus in strange ways on loss of control.nOrgasm is at least a semi-willing loss ofncontrol, a seizure of desire, yet O’Brien’snprotagonist, who tells her bizarre talenfrom prison, murders from revulsion atnwitnessing an epileptic’s seizure, his totaln10;nChronicles of Culturenloss of control to the electrical aberrations,nthe private physical demons, whichnwithout warning possess him. O’Brien’snnarrator is Nora (is her inhumanity thenprice women pay for slamming the dollnhouse door?); her young lover is Hartn(does she kill the heart within himnbecause his abandonment to his diseasenis greater than any seizures with her?).nLike an “unenlightened” medievalist,nO’Brien equates the epileptic convulsionnwith the erotic convulsion. Were this anbetter book, one might examine O’Brien’snmistaken peasant analogies. As it is, suchnan exercise is not worth the trouble.nIt’s a big lonely world out there—andnScum As Modern HeronHarold Robbins: Dreams Die First;nSimon & Schuster, Inc.; New York.nby Stephen R. Maloneynrlarry Robbins’ fourteenth novelnis a book whose main reason for being isnto make a very wealthy man, Robbins,neven richer. I suspected it would be illwritten,nderivative and morally scabrous.nRobbins never disappoints.nThe protagonist of Dreams Die Firstnis, like Robbins, a merchant of sexualnfantasies. When Gareth Brendan is notnsnorting cocaine, mowing down hirednkillers with his Rolls Royce, or sodomizingnbeach boys, he is building a businessnempire based upon a sex magazine callednMacho. Today’s entrepreneur, it seems,ndoes not build a better mousetrap; hencreates a more vulgar “centerfold.”nGareth Brendan has much in commonnwith Larry Flynt, publisher of Hustler.nAt this moment, the publisher of Hustlernis lying paralyzed from the waist down—angrim irony—in a Georgia hospital. Withnthe assailant still at large, one can speculatenif he (or she?) was a Hustler reader,nDr Maloney taught English poetry atnthe Universities of Rochester and Georgianand now works for a major oil companynin Oklahoma.nnnin here. We all fail each other, fail knowinglynand unknowingly; we all need comfort,nconsolation. However, neither ofnthese two books is about sexuality as fun,nsolace, consolation, “love,” the magicnmystical synchrony of the Keatsian moment,nthe right person at the right time.nMcNeill and O’Brien in non-fictionnand fiction depict sexuality as perverse,ndehumanizing. In their supermarketsnof sensation, love and sickness arenequated, and sexuality becomes a toxicnagent. A sad commentary on what shouldnbe the most intimate, fulfilling satisfactionnin our anonymous, unsatisfactory,nfractured world. Dnone who took the magazine’s implicitnmessage of contempt for others literally.nErnest van den Haag finds the centernof pornography in its view of life asnconsisting of organs and orifices and thenpermutations thereof. Perhaps we couldnexpand this to say that pornography takesnviolence against others, especially maniacalnstabbings and shootings, and calls itnsexuality. The violent thrustings andnpenetratings of pornography remind usnnot of lovemaking but of maniacal stabbings,nbrutal beatings, of bullets beingnIn April. 1978 — 2.1 weeks on ihcnSew York limes liooU Ririeir Ik-srnSC’IILTS lisr.npumped into violently contorted bodies.nPornography, in other words, is sublimatednmurder. Many realize this, in ournsociety, however, nothing is done to stopnthe murder. And those who counselnagainst doing anything against it, do sonin the name of freedom and democracy.nIn pornography, sexuality means notnfreedom but control. In Dreams Die First,nGareth’s boy-lover tells him he wants tonbe his “slave.” One of Gareth’s girl-friendsnhabitually sneaks into his apartment andndons a French maid’s outfit the better ton”serve” him. And another girlfriendn