There are elements in the desert fantasy which make it interesting and attractive. Some of these might be noted. The desert, with its oases and caravans, and camel bells, and dancing girls, and striped tents, and palm trees, and bandits, etc., is a romantic locale. It beats downtown Chicago. Further, the position of the woman in Arabian culture, particularly in the past, is very low. Thus if an aristocratic English lady, for example, is captured, she would have very little going for her, which makes the fantasy better. She is to begin with only a female; further she is a captive; further she is to her captors a cultural “outsider”; they need have no respect for her; indeed, she is only a lovely infidel, white and beautiful, less than an animal, completely at their mercy; further, she is a woman of the enemy; and, thus, it is only to be expected that their hatred of the west, which threatens them and their way of life, and regards itself as superior to them, their rage and resentment, will be ventilated on her; they will see that they get much pleasure from her; they will make the west pay; she will stand proxy for the west; we may expect that she will be put to detailed and harsh use; further, she is their secret prisoner; no one knows her whereabouts; she cannot escape across the desert; she is helplessly theirs; the aristocratic, beautiful English lady, put in barbaric ornaments, dressed revealingly for the tactual and visual pleasures of her captors, can be in little doubt as to her new identity; she can now be bought and sold; she must be obedient; she must do whatever she is told; she is now only an educated, white slave girl, the property of barbarian Arab masters.

What happens to her, what is done to her, is up to the creators of the fantasy.

12. The Captured-by-Indians Fantasy.

She is captured by Indians.

Comment:

If the husband and wife enjoy horseback riding, some riding can help them get into the mood for this fantasy. They can plan it together, and play parts of it among themselves as they ride.

It also works well if the husband and wife are hikers or campers, where the openness of nature, with its felicitous air and stimulating scenery can provide an incomparable setting for the fantasy’s enactment.

How many husbands have actually pursued their wife through a woods, or among hills, and have captured her? Girls love running from a man they would be delighted to be caught by. It seems to be in their blood both to flee and to yield deliciously, delightedly, when, inevitably, they fall prey. The chase is, probably for genetic reasons going back to evolutional selections, sexually stimulating to them; it is, of course, disappointing to them if, at its conclusion, they are not captured, and, uncompromisingly, sexually possessed by their captor. This all presupposes, of course, that she desires her capture. It is one thing to be chased by one whom one loves, in play, and quite another to be chased by some nut she has never seen before. The first is a delight for a woman; the second is only a misery. Interestingly, nature has not equipped her to outrun either.