These two novels together comprise one of the most fascinating, obsessive, and erotic works of contemporary French fiction. Philosophically and theologically concerned with "the tension between the form and its actuality," on the simple level of fiction they relate the amatory adventures of an elderly philosopher and his voluptuous young wife whom he is compelled to expose to temptations of the flesh on the premise that identity becomes actualized through interaction with a third person. Klossowski explores the nature of the ultimate relationship between body and soul in a rare combination of a surrealistic work with sadistic, philosophical, and theological overtones.