Thousands of years ago, power was mostly gained through physical vio-
lence and maintained with brute strength. There was little need for
subtlety—a king or emperor had to be merciless. Only a select few had
power, but no one suffered under this scheme of things more than women.
They had no way to compete, no weapon at their disposal that could make
a man do what they wanted—politically, socially, or even in the home.
Of course men had one weakness: their insatiable desire for sex. A
woman could always toy with this desire, but once she gave in to sex the
man was back in control; and if she withheld sex, he could simply look
elsewhere—or exert force. What good was a power that was so temporary
and frail? Yet women had no choice but to submit to this condition. There
were some, though, whose hunger for power was too great, and who, over
the years, through much cleverness and creativity, invented a way of turn-
ing the dynamic around, creating a more lasting and effective form of
power.
These women—among them Bathsheba, from the Old Testament;
Helen of Troy; the Chinese siren Hsi Shi; and the greatest of them all,
Cleopatra—invented seduction. First they would draw a man in with an al-
luring appearance, designing their makeup and adornment to fashion the
image of a goddess come to life. By showing only glimpses of flesh, they
would tease a man's imagination, stimulating the desire not just for sex but
for something greater: the chance to possess a fantasy figure. Once they had
their victims' interest, these women would lure them away from the mascu-
line world of war and politics and get them to spend time in the feminine
world—a world of luxury, spectacle, and pleasure. They might also lead
them astray literally, taking them on a journey, as Cleopatra lured Julius
Caesar on a trip down the Nile. Men would grow hooked on these refined,
sensual pleasures—they would fall in love. But then, invariably, the women
would turn cold and indifferent, confusing their victims. Just when the
men wanted more, they found their pleasures withdrawn. They would be
forced into pursuit, trying anything to win back the favors they once had
tasted and growing weak and emotional in the process. Men who had
physical force and all the social power—men like King David, the Trojan
Paris, Julius Caesar, Mark Antony, King Fu Chai—would find themselves
becoming the slave of a woman.
In the face of violence and brutality, these women made seduction asophisticated art, the ultimate form of power and persuasion. They learned
to work on the mind first, stimulating fantasies, keeping a man wanting
more, creating patterns of hope and despair—the essence of seduction.
Their power was not physical but psychological, not forceful but indirect
and cunning. These first great seductresses were like military generals plan-
ning the destruction of an enemy, and indeed early accounts of seduction
often compare it to battle, the feminine version of warfare. For Cleopatra,
it was a means of consolidating an empire. In seduction, the woman was no
longer a passive sex object; she had become an active agent, a figure of
power.
With a few exceptions—the Latin poet Ovid, the medieval
troubadours—men did not much concern themselves with such a frivolous
art as seduction. Then, in the seventeenth century came a great change:
men grew interested in seduction as a way to overcome a young woman's
resistance to sex. History's first great male seducers—the Duke de Lauzun,
the different Spaniards who inspired the Don Juan legend—began to adopt
the methods traditionally employed by women. They learned to dazzle
with their appearance (often androgynous in nature), to stimulate the
imagination, to play the coquette. They also added a new, masculine ele-
ment to the game: seductive language, for they had discovered a woman's
weakness for soft words. These two forms of seduction—the feminine use
of appearances and the masculine use of language—would often cross
gender lines: Casanova would dazzle a woman with his clothes; Ninon
de l'Enclos would charm a man with her words.
At the same time that men were developing their version of seduction,
others began to adapt the art for social purposes. As Europe's feudal system
of government faded into the past, courtiers needed to get their way in
court without the use of force. They learned the power to be gained by se-
ducing their superiors and competitors through psychological games, soft
words, a little coquetry. As culture became democratized, actors, dandies,
and artists came to use the tactics of seduction as a way to charm and win
over their audience and social milieu. In the nineteenth century another
great change occurred: politicians like Napoleon consciously saw them-
selves as seducers, on a grand scale. These men depended on the art of seductive oratory, but they also mastered what had once been feminine
strategies: staging vast spectacles, using theatrical devices, creating a charged
physical presence. All this, they learned, was the essence of charisma—and
remains so today. By seducing the masses they could accumulate immense
power without the use of force.
Today we have reached the ultimate point in the evolution of seduc-
tion. Now more than ever, force or brutality of any kind is discouraged. All
areas of social life require the ability to persuade people in a way that does
not offend or impose itself. Forms of seduction can be found everywhere,
blending male and female strategies. Advertisements insinuate, the soft sell
dominates. If we are to change people's opinions—and affecting opinion is
basic to seduction—we must act in subtle, subliminal ways. Today no political campaign can work without seduction. Since the era of John F.
Kennedy, political figures are required to have a degree of charisma, a fasci-
nating presence to keep their audience's attention, which is half the battle.
The film world and media create a galaxy of seductive stars and images. We
are saturated in the seductive. But even if much has changed in degree and
scope, the essence of seduction is constant: never be forceful or direct; in-
stead, use pleasure as bait, playing on people's emotions, stirring desire and
confusion, inducing psychological surrender. In seduction as it is practiced
today, the methods of Cleopatra still hold.
People are constantly trying to influence us, to tell us what to do, and just
as often we tune them out, resisting their attempts at persuasion. There is a
moment in our lives, however, when we all act differently—when we are in
love. We fall under a kind of spell. Our minds are usually preoccupied with
our own concerns; now they become filled with thoughts of the loved one.
We grow emotional, lose the ability to think straight, act in foolish ways
that we would never do otherwise. If this goes on long enough something
inside us gives way: we surrender to the will of the loved one, and to our
desire to possess them.
Seducers are people who understand the tremendous power contained
in such moments of surrender. They analyze what happens when people
are in love, study the psychological components of the process—what spurs
the imagination, what casts a spell. By instinct and through practice they
master the art of making people fall in love. As the first seductresses knew,
it is much more effective to create love than lust. A person in love is emo-
tional, pliable, and easily misled. (The origin of the word "seduction" is the
Latin for "to lead astray") A person in lust is harder to control and, once
satisfied, may easily leave you. Seducers take their time, create enchantment
and the bonds of love, so that when sex ensues it only further enslaves
the victim. Creating love and enchantment becomes the model for all
seductions—sexual, social, political. A person in love will surrender.
It is pointless to try to argue against such power, to imagine that you are
not interested in it, or that it is evil and ugly. The harder you try to resist
the lure of seduction—as an idea, as a form of power—the more you will
find yourself fascinated. The reason is simple: most of us have known the
power of having someone fall in love with us. Our actions, gestures, the
things we say, all have positive effects on this person; we may not com-
pletely understand what we have done right, but this feeling of power is in-
toxicating. It gives us confidence, which makes us more seductive. We may
also experience this in a social or work setting—one day we are in an ele-
vated mood and people seem more responsive, more charmed by us. These
moments of power are fleeting, but they resonate in the memory with
great intensity. We want them back. Nobody likes to feel awkward or timid
or unable to reach people. The siren call of seduction is irresistible because
power is irresistible, and nothing will bring you more power in the modern
world than the ability to seduce. Repressing the desire to seduce is a kind of hysterical reaction, revealing your deep-down fascination with the process;
you are only making your desires stronger. Some day they will come to the
surface.
To have such power does not require a total transformation in your
character or any kind of physical improvement in your looks. Seduction is a
game of psychology, not beauty, and it is within the grasp of any person to
become a master at the game. All that is required is that you look at the
world differently, through the eyes of a seducer.
A seducer does not turn the power off and on—every social and per-
sonal interaction is seen as a potential seduction. There is never a moment
to waste. This is so for several reasons. The power seducers have over a man
or woman works in social environments because they have learned how to
tone down the sexual element without getting rid of it. We may think we
see through them, but they are so pleasant to be around anyway that it does
not matter. Trying to divide your life into moments in which you seduce
and others in which you hold back will only confuse and constrain you.
Erotic desire and love lurk beneath the surface of almost every human en-
counter; better to give free rein to your skills than to try to use them only
in the bedroom. (In fact, the seducer sees the world as his or her bedroom.)
This attitude creates great seductive momentum, and with each seduction
you gain experience and practice. One social or sexual seduction makes the
next one easier, your confidence growing and making you more alluring.
People are drawn to you in greater numbers as the seducer's aura descends
upon you.
Seducers have a warrior's outlook on life. They see each person as a
kind of walled castle to which they are laying siege. Seduction is a process
of penetration: initially penetrating the target's mind, their first point of
defense. Once seducers have penetrated the mind, making the target fanta-
size about them, it is easy to lower resistance and create physical surrender.
Seducers do not improvise; they do not leave this process to chance. Like
any good general, they plan and strategize, aiming at the target's particular
weaknesses.
The main obstacle to becoming a seducer is this foolish prejudice we
have of seeing love and romance as some kind of sacred, magical realm
where things just fall into place, if they are meant to. This might seem ro-
mantic and quaint, but it is really just a cover for our laziness. What will se-
duce a person is the effort we expend on their behalf, showing how much
we care, how much they are worth. Leaving things to chance is a recipe for
disaster, and reveals that we do not take love and romance very seriously. It
was the effort Casanova expended, the artfulness he applied to each affair
that made him so devilishly seductive. Falling in love is a matter not of
magic but of psychology. Once you understand your target's psychology,
and strategize to suit it, you will be better able to cast a "magical" spell. A
seducer sees love not as sacred but as warfare, where all is fair.
Seducers are never self-absorbed. Their gaze is directed outward, not
inward. When they meet someone their first move is to get inside that person's skin, to see the world through their eyes. The reasons for this are sev-
eral. First, self-absorption is a sign of insecurity; it is anti-seductive. Every-
one has insecurities, but seducers manage to ignore them, finding therapy
for moments of self-doubt by being absorbed in the world. This gives them
a buoyant spirit—we want to be around them. Second, getting into some-
one's skin, imagining what it is like to be them, helps the seducer gather
valuable information, learn what makes that person tick, what will make
them lose their ability to think straight and fall into a trap. Armed with
such information, they can provide focused and individualized attention—a
rare commodity in a world in which most people see us only from behind
the screen of their own prejudices. Getting into the targets' skin is the first
important tactical move in the war of penetration.
Seducers see themselves as providers of pleasure, like bees that gather
pollen from some flowers and deliver it to others. As children we mostly
devoted our lives to play and pleasure. Adults often have feelings of being
cut off from this paradise, of being weighed down by responsibilities. The
seducer knows that people are waiting for pleasure—they never get enough
of it from friends and lovers, and they cannot get it by themselves. A person
who enters their lives offering adventure and romance cannot be resisted.
Pleasure is a feeling of being taken past our limits, of being overwhelmed—
by another person, by an experience. People are dying to be overwhelmed,
to let go of their usual stubbornness. Sometimes their resistance to us is
a way of saying, Please seduce me. Seducers know that the possibility of
pleasure will make a person follow them, and the experience of it will
make someone open up, weak to the touch. They also train themselves to
be sensitive to pleasure, knowing that feeling pleasure themselves will make
it that much easier for them to infect the people around them.
A seducer sees all of life as theater, everyone an actor. Most people feel
they have constricted roles in life, which makes them unhappy. Seducers,
on the other hand, can be anyone and can assume many roles. (The arche-
type here is the god Zeus, insatiable seducer of young maidens, whose
main weapon was the ability to assume the form of whatever person or ani-
mal would most appeal to his victim.) Seducers take pleasure in performing
and are not weighed down by their identity, or by some need to be them-
selves, or to be natural. This freedom of theirs, this fluidity in body and
spirit, is what makes them attractive. What people lack in life is not more
reality but illusion, fantasy, play. The clothes that seducers wear, the places
they take you to, their words and actions, are slightly heightened—not
overly theatrical but with a delightful edge of unreality, as if the two of you
were living out a piece of fiction or were characters in a film. Seduction is
a kind of theater in real life, the meeting of illusion and reality.
Finally, seducers are completely amoral in their approach to life. It is all
a game, an arena for play. Knowing that the moralists, the crabbed repressed
types who croak about the evils of the seducer, secretly envy their power,
they do not concern themselves with other people's opinions. They do not
deal in moral judgments—nothing could be less seductive. Everything is pliant, fluid, like life itself. Seduction is a form of deception, but people
want to be led astray, they yearn to be seduced. If they didn't, seducers
would not find so many willing victims. Get rid of any moralizing tenden-
cies, adopt the seducer's playful philosophy, and you will find the rest of the
process easy and natural.
The Art of Seduction is designed to arm you with weapons of persuasion and
charm, so that those around you will slowly lose their ability to resist with-
out knowing how or why it has happened. It is an art of war for delicate
times.
Every seduction has two elements that you must analyze and under-
stand: first, yourself and what is seductive about you; and second, your tar-
get and the actions that will penetrate their defenses and create surrender.
The two sides are equally important. If you strategize without paying at-
tention to the parts of your character that draw people to you, you will be
seen as a mechanical seducer, slimy and manipulative. If you rely on your
seductive personality without paying attention to the other person, you will
make terrible mistakes and limit your potential.
Consequently, The Art of Seduction is divided into two parts. The first
half, "The Seductive Character," describes the nine types of seducer, plus
the Anti-Seducer. Studying these types will make you aware of what is
inherently seductive in your character, the basic building block of any se-
duction. The second half, "The Seductive Process," includes the twenty-
four maneuvers and strategies that will instruct you on how to create a
spell, break down people's resistance, give movement and force to your
seduction, and induce surrender in your target. As a kind of bridge be-
tween the two parts, there is a chapter on the eighteen types of victims of a
seduction—each of them missing something from their lives, each cradling
an emptiness you can fill. Knowing what type you are dealing with will
help you put into practice the ideas in both sections. Ignore any part of this
book and you will be an incomplete seducer.
The ideas and strategies in The Art of Seduction are based on the writings
and historical accounts of the most successful seducers in history. The
sources include the seducers' own memoirs (by Casanova, Errol Flynn, Na-
talie Barney, Marilyn Monroe); biographies (of Cleopatra, Josephine Bona-
parte, John F. Kennedy, Duke Ellington); handbooks on the subject (most
notably Ovid's Art of Love); and fictional accounts of seductions (Choderlos
de Laclos's Dangerous Liaisons, Søren Kierkegaard's The Seducer's Diary,
Murasaki Shikibu's The Tale of Genji). The heroes and heroines of these lit-
erary works are generally modeled on real-life seducers. The strategies they
employ reveal the intimate connection between fiction and seduction, cre-
ating illusion and leading a person along. In putting the book's lessons into
practice, you will be following in the path of the greatest masters of the art.
Finally, the spirit that will make you a consummate seducer is the spirit
in which you should read this book. The French writer Denis Diderot
once wrote, "I give my mind the liberty to follow the first wise or foolish idea that presents itself, just as in the avenue de Foy our dissolute youths
follow close on the heels of some strumpet, then leave her to pursue an-
other, attacking all of them and attaching themselves to none. My thoughts
are my strumpets." He meant that he let himself be seduced by ideas, fol-
lowing whichever one caught his fancy until a better one came along, his
thoughts infused with a kind of sexual excitement. Once you enter these
pages, do as Diderot advised: let yourself be lured by the stories and ideas,
your mind open and your thoughts fluid. Slowly you will find yourself absorbing the poison through the skin and you will begin to see everything as
a seduction, including the way you think and how you look at the world.
Most virtue is a demand for greater seduction.
—NATALIE BARNEY