Syta’s Harem and Pharaoh’s Lover

These two lush, phantasmagoric novellas from French Decadent Vaudère (1857–1908), here appearing in their first English translation, explore love and death. The narrative of Syta’s Harem, a highly saturated Orientalist fantasy, glides between enchantment, eroticism, and horror. Queen Syta, the tyrannical ruler of an ancient kingdom (a hazy take on ancient India) with a harem of male idolizers, meets a mysterious man in the forest and develops an erotic fixation with him. Her pursuit of his love leads her to witness sacred orgies, child sacrifice, and other dark religious practices. Vaudère illustrates this tale with vivid imagery and dazzling atmospherics while still delivering emotional depth. In the more straightforward Pharaoh’s Lover, set during the reign of Thutmose I, Zelinis, an enchantress and dancer, is separated from her fiancé, Hary-Thé, chief of the Royal Guard, by a curse. Zelenis turns to homoerotic affairs in Hary-Thé’s absence, while Hary-Thé descends into necrophilia. Though the exoticized settings are dated, Vaudère’s prose is breathtaking. This is a must-read for any fan of the Decadent movement. (June)