"However, even in those years, there was no doubt for me on this matter: I did not like what we call 'carnal pleasures' because they are indeed always meaningless. The only thing I liked was everything we consider 'dirty.' Nor did the usual debauchery satisfy me; on the contrary, because all it does is to dirty the debauchery and leaves untouched, in one way or another, something superior and absolutely pure. The debauchery I know tarnishes not only my body and my thoughts but also everything that my mind can grasp in front of it, that is, the vast starry universe that plays only the role of a backdrop." (Excerpt from the work, from the back cover of the book)

The relationship with Bataille's work is a difficult one, not only because it requires a radical revision of all dominant opinions and a risky re-examination of all the constituents of thought on man and the world, but mainly because it demands a gaze that looks beyond the deceptive phenomena to the essence of events, the deeper causation of actions, the innermost origin of human history, that point of unspeakable horror that we all inevitably carry within us, which we do not dare to face, which we reject or overlook, for just the suspicion of it drives us mad, but which is the source of the most hideous and magnificent actions of man. That point from which the History of the Eye emerged.

[Excerpt from the translator's note]