The most successful fantasy of this type with which I am familiar was written by a woman, E. M. Hull. It was called The Sheik. It was not known, when it was published, that the author was a woman. It caused something of a stir when it leaked out. The movie, starring Rudolph Valentino, was a hit, and remains a delightful classic. Similarly, the sequel, Son of the Sheik, was popular, and that movie, too, is a classic. The books, in their time, were best sellers. The movies, even today, are joys. Doubtless much of the success of the movies is due to the remarkable performances of Mr. Valentino. For example, I have never seen another actor who, when he wishes, can express a man’s joy in touching a woman as well as he. It has never even occurred, as far as I can tell, to most men that touching a woman is, or can be, a joyful experience. On the screen Valentino conveyed that women are marvelously desirable and beautiful creatures. Very few screen lovers convey anything of the simple appreciation of how fantastic women are. To be sure, Valentino could portray the looming, dark, male menace, dangerous, desirable, sensuous, intent upon her sexual subjugation, but, too, like perhaps no other actor, he could, when he wished, exhibit that he was almost uncontrollably thrilled and delighted to hold a woman in his arms. If that is flattery, it is flattery that will get a man just about anywhere. Women were not, to those of Valentino’s generation, chicks and foxes and broads. His was a more romantic generation. Cloak swirling, on his Arabian stallion, he bore her with him, a captive, to his tent in the desert, there to be ravished at his leisure. Women, in his day, pale, proud and beautiful, were thought to be worthy prizes, worth capturing and carrying off. Today it is not clear that there is that much point in bothering. Even the sheik would not be tempted to carry off today’s gum-chewing, pot-smoking chick. He would just feel stupid. She is fortunate, perhaps, that she is permitted to avail herself of public transportation. Hopefully, somewhere between the pale lady and the broad is something else, maybe a woman. Valentino, I would guess, in the Sheik and the Son of the Sheik, tended to realize the fantasy dream, or create something which could be accepted as an authentic fantasy dream, of many women. Not every movie of his is as popular as these two. Blood and Sand, for example, doubtless a better movie, is not as popular or as much shown. The success of these two movies is doubtless largely due to Mr. Valentino, but, I suspect, there is more involved. The fantasy plot, so superbly realized by Mr. Valentino, is powerful in its own right. I should like to think their success is not due simply to Mr. Valentino’s presence in the films per se so much as it is also due, importantly, to his superb realization of the fantasy. His unusual and remarkable talents brought the fantasy to life, and brought it to life in pageantry and detail. Fantasy and Valentino is a potent combination. The books, as I mentioned, were best sellers, too. And the first book, of course, was published before the movie. The books turned on women all over the English-speaking world. It is extremely interesting and revealing that the author was a woman. That should shake up men a bit about what goes on in the pretty heads of lovely ladies. Surely it should make them seem more human, and more interesting. Further, it makes clear that the fantasies of men and women tend to be similar, save for the difference in perspective. Men often fantasize adventure, capture and rape, for instance; it is nice to know that women do, too. The men, in their fantasies, commonly do the capturing and raping; and the women, in their fantasies, commonly, by some coincidence, are the ones captured and raped. There is a set of congruent fantasies! All men and women have to do now is to put together their fantasies and get ready for a corking good time.